Tallinn: The Latest Architecture and News

Out of 200 applicants, London-based Gilles Retsin Architecture won the Tallinn Architecture Biennale 2017 competition with their temporary outdoor installation. Participants were challenged to use the fabrication abilities of Estonian wooden house manufacturers in a new and creative way. Jury member Martin Tamke said the Retsin proposal is, “characterized by outstanding aesthetic and intellectually challenging, as it questions current beliefs and trends in architecture."

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Zaha Hadid Architects has been selected as the winners of an international competition to masterplan the revitalization of the Old City Harbour in Tallinn, Estonia. Beating out an esteemed shortlist of 6 teams, including AZPML, KCAP Architects & Planners and Helsinki-based ALA Architects, ZHA’s proposal was lauded by the client for its “innovative and integrated approach to Tallinn’s maritime gateway.

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The Tallinn Architecture Biennale have announced Claudia Pasquero, Director of ecoLogicStudio, as the Head Curator of the 2017 edition, "bioTallinn". According to the organizers, a programme of exhibitions and symposia will "engage various architectural offices, artists, and scientists on the topic of biotechnology in architecture," examining in particular "the relationship between nature and the city in the Anthropocene age."

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European Architecture
www.ttu.ee/?id=106559

The Open Academy of the Estonian Academy of Arts (EAA) is very excited to launch the 2017 Tallinn Summer Academy of Art, Design and Architecture – Edge/Blurring Boundaries! The courses will take place in August 2017 and focus on innovative, solution-seeking, salient topics: cooperation between the natural environment and humans in nature, mapping roads and traffic to improve the efficacy of investments into public space, Estonian artistic life in the regional and international context, constructing and building large-scale, custom-dimensioned features for the elephants of the Tallinn Zoo and linking art and technology in Clay 3D printing. The teaching staff of the Summer Academy includes leading educators, researchers and artists from the EAA and partner universities.

Videos

Tallinn Architecture Biennale 2017 have announced the TAB 2017 Vision Competition, offering architects, scientists and artists the chance to define a new urbanity of the Paljassaare Peninsula in Tallinn in the era when no ecosystem is unaffected by human action. The deadline for the one-stage international competition is 25th of April 2017.

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Tallinn Architecture Biennale 2017 is announcing TAB 2017 Urban Installation Programme Open Call, offering emerging architectural talent the opportunity to design and build an experimental wooden folly in the heart of Tallinn. The international open two-stage competition is challenging participants to develop creative designs for a temporary outdoor installation, making innovative use of the fabrication capacities with the Estonian wooden house manufacturers. The aim is to promote synergy between emerging designers and industry.

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Videos

Estonian contemporary architecture is diverse in nature. Here, one can find the spark and freshness of Danish- and Dutch-influenced architecture as well as the tradition-carrying conservatism of Nordic Modernism. A third trend that can be highlighted in contemporary Estonian architecture is a context-sensitive approach to built environment, in which particular emphasis is placed upon the historical, social, as well as spatial contexts. Siiri Vallner’s works may be classified into the latter of these three groups. The buildings she has designed do not number many, but by way of their spatial ideas and solutions they have strongly influenced and enriched Estonia’s architectural culture.

Siiri Vallner is currently sharing her office Kavakava with Indrek Peil, another relatively young Estonian architect. Vallner has received several awards over the last few years. In 2013, together with Indrek Peil, Katrin Koov, and interior architect Hannes Praks, she was awarded the National Culture Award for their architectural solution for the University of Tartu’s Narva College in Narva, Estonia. She was likewise one of three female architects to be given special international recognition at the “arcVision Prize – Women in Architecture” competition in Italy (2013). I spoke with Vallner about both her work and her projects.

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