Architectural Competitions

"Competitions are without doubt a controversial topic: they have been (and will continue to be) discussed both as architectural ‘creativity feasts’, and ‘blood-sucking beasts’ of the profession; as instigators of innovation, and obsolete mechanisms for the misuse of a profuse cultural and financial capital; as grounds for discussion and consensus, and biased spaces of eclectic  favouritism; as waste fields of inspiration and hope, and idealised, artistic challenges for excellence. However, [...] experimentation is possible within the competitions’ background and processual framework; experimentation [...] in terms of procedures, architectural design and its representational vocabulary, social and political settings."

From the afterword of The Competition Grid; Experimenting With and Within Architecture Competitions

ed. by Katsakou A. & Theodorou M., London: RIBA Publishing, 2018