Non-profit organisation HouseEurope! has been named winner of this year’s Obel Award for “its spearheading role” in creating a fairer and more sustainable construction industry across Europe.
HouseEurope! is a policy lab encouraging an industry-wide shift away from demolition and for-profit developments to preserve existing communities across Europe and save on energy and resources.
It was selected as the seventh winner of the prestigious annual Obel Award, for which this year’s theme was Ready Made, for its “spearheading role in raising awareness and mobilising public support for a paradigm shift in European construction and housing culture”, according to the jury.
Jury chair Nathalie de Vries, who is a founding partner of MVRDV, said HouseEurope! offers an example of how architects can “act as civic agents”.
“HouseEurope! demonstrates the scale, agency, and responsibility inherent in architecture,” she said.
“As architects, we are not merely practitioners who receive and execute instructions – we can and should act as civic agents within the political and social frameworks to work towards the common good.”
HouseEurope!’s current focus is on passing a new EU law that would make the renovation and transformation of buildings easier and more affordable.
To achieve this, it is currently running a European Citizens’ Initiative – a procedure that allows EU citizens to propose new laws by collecting at least one million signatures from seven different countries. If successful, the European Commission will consider the proposal.
The organisation’s legal proposal focuses on the right to reuse existing buildings, proposing measures such as tax reductions for renovation works and reused materials, and fairer frameworks for when it comes to assessing the potential and risks of a structure.
“Every minute, a building in Europe is destroyed – not by natural disasters, but by financial speculation,” HouseEurope!’s campaign manager Alina Kolar and co-initiator Olaf Grawert said.
“And while a few profit, we all pay the price: with rising rents and rising temperatures,” they continued. “HouseEurope! is a call to action: sign and support now to stop the demolition drama and renovate, don’t speculate!”
Through its selection of HouseEurope! as the 2025 winner, the Obel Award jury hopes to reiterate the collective power of the profession to rethink current systems.
The Obel Award was established in 2019 to recognise architecture projects that serve as agents of change in the industry.
Previous winners include landscape studio Scape, which was awarded the prize for its “visionary” coastal defence system in New York City, and British company Seratech, which won for its prototype carbon-neutral concrete.
The photography is courtesy of HouseEurope! unless otherwise stated.
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