Foreword
We are delighted to announce the results of the Retreat Center Design 2023 competition. This competition was conceived with a deep understanding of the profound impact that the built environment has on the human mind and behavior. It sought to explore the intricate relationship between spaces and the human experience, recognizing that every space possesses a unique quality that resonates with our physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual dimensions.
As human beings, we are inherently connected to our environment in profound ways. The spaces we inhabit, whether they be homes, workplaces, or retreat centers, play a vital role in shaping our well-being and fostering a sense of connection with ourselves and the world around us. This competition aimed to delve into the essence of these connections and celebrate the transformative power of thoughtful architectural design.
Throughout the competition, participants from across the globe demonstrated their unwavering commitment to this exploration. Their visionary designs not only showcased architectural excellence but also exemplified a deep understanding of the intricate interplay between form and function. Each submission was a testament to the creativity, innovation, and dedication of the designers.
Scroll down to check the winning entries:
Top 3
FIRST
Mu Qu Jennifer Liu, Natalie Cole Bajet & Nikki Elim Ng
Canada
SECOND
Yu Li
China
THIRD
Firdevs Aydın, Hakan Koç, Tuğçe Sena Özdemir & Mert Tunay
Turkey
FIRST PRIZE WINNER
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Pause Chaos
Mu Qu Jennifer Liu, Natalie Cole Bajet & Nikki Elim Ng
Canada
JURY COMMENTS
This is a beautifully drawn project on the Tamsui River, and although the atmosphere created may not be realistic in terms of an inner city site, the author’s intentions are clear and convincing. (What happened to the decay?) The use of ephemera is delightful with strong materiality and ambiance: dried grass blankets, mist, etc. With strengths such as this it is not necessary to be so prescriptive with the procession through the program.
-Sand Helsel
A very innovative yet evocative proposal..
-Sidra Khokhar
SECOND PRIZE WINNER
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Guan
Yu Li
China
JURY COMMENTS
The proposal starts with good research and good diagrams of meditation techniques. This is a refined scheme, that is well incorporated into the treed site. The drawings are well crafted and appropriate to test the intentions of the project, though the atmosphere is labelled more often than drawn. It is unclear why the planning is formalist and why the building a modernist white given the context.-
-Sand Helsel
A very well thought out proposal with attention to detailing and structure which was refreshing to see! The project alo stands out for me for its sheer consistency and unification between experiences.
-Sidra Khokhar
THIRD PRIZE WINNER
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The Cocoon
Firdevs Aydın, Hakan Koç, Tuğçe Sena Özdemir & Mert Tunay
Turkey
JURY COMMENTS
The Cocoon is an inner city intervention that enables individuals to tailor make their own experience in crowded Istanbul. There is a clever use of space in the tight site and the timber and glass building within a vertical garden offers a contemporary idiom, where the private and larger public functions coexist comfortably. The project is well explained and contextualised both verbally and visually.
-Sand Helsel
Interesting to see that the existing threat of natural disaster has been addressed in the context of Turkey.
-Sidra Khokhar
SPECIAL MENTION
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Back to Nature
Chuchu Chen
U.S.
JURY COMMENTS
The project relies on simplicity and purity as ‘primitive huts’ in the landscape. Natural materials are used, and the structures have poetic qualities and are well integrated into the landscape. The proposal, however, remains as a series of fragments, and despite being well developed and drawn, the project as a whole has no clear overall conceptual narrative and no contemporary twists to offer an innovative solution.
-Sand Helsel
A beautiful spatial representation of what the concept of a retreat should essentially entail! I am impressed with the depth of this project. A visual treat to see and understand in terms of the spatial progression that has been established with the kind of experiences being devised for the users.
-Sidra Khokhar
Honorable Mention
Mingda Yang, Jiahao Zhang, Yi Shen
China
Julius Bykowski
Germany
Hanzhuo Liang, Zhanpeng Lei, Danqing Wang
China
Alyssia Wong, Britney Krebs,, Vivan Pham, Rico del Moral
U.S.
HONOURABLE MENTION
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Stir up the corner of ground
Mingda Yang, Jiahao Zhang, Yi Shen
China
JURY COMMENTS
This is a strong, innovative project that ‘grounds’ the building in a clearing in the forest The massive inverted cone roof appears to hover gently over the ground, above a large sunken space with a rocky floor. The plan offers a range of well-scaled spaces from small to large with different atmospheres created by light, shadow, views, and compressed and expanded volumes. This vacillations between the natural and man-made are subtle and sophisticated, and demonstrated in carefully selected and crafted atmospheric sections.
-Sand Helsel
The project is a satifactory attempt at understanding the architectonics behind the experiential aspect of a retreat centre.
-Sidra Khokhar
HONOURABLE MENTION
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Reformed Castle
Julius Bykowski
Germany
JURY COMMENTS
Burnout and depression are addressed in this elegant, well developed, and beautifully drawn project. The site selection of a ruined castle is inspired in respect of a nurturing program within the shelter of the castle fortifications. The siting not only promotes sustainable reuse, but also embraces nature within the crumbling architecture which the author has capitalised on with the contrast between old and new construction and interior and exterior spaces. The ambiance is intimate, protected and nurturing as demonstrated in thoughtful interior renders.
-Sand Helsel
A very interesting approach to highlight adaptive reuse in castle ruins. It is ironic that you have stated that the selection of such a building typology is random as it negates that whole idea of conciously developing a project proposal in the first place! It would also have been more appropriate to mention which castle/ruin has been selected by you and why precisely rather than making the entire centre seem like a generic tourist look out spot!
-Sidra Khokhar
HONOURABLE MENTION
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Kieu Gur - Cultural Memorial Hall Style Retreat Center
Hanzhuo Liang, Zhanpeng Lei, Danqing Wang
China
JURY COMMENTS
The Healing Ark unites architecture, planning and landscape to create a topography along the water’s edge. This is a good siting strategy (and a provocative initial image) which would have been improved by specifically articulating a relationship to the coastline rather than being constrained by the metaphor of an upturned boat. The building development becomes overly prescriptive rather than atmospheric, as a result.
-Sandra Helsel
A very well thought out approach to highlight the undermined Yaghan people and their unique heritage. The concept ideation from that of a canoe that is so deeply rooted with the Yaghan way of life is very commendable! I thoroughly enjoyed learning about how the project has cateogorized the Yaghan culture into architectural spaces. It would have been nice to see the development of spatial configuration between interior and exterior spaces in more depth as well on a master plan level. Well done!
-Sidra Khokhar
HONOURABLE MENTION
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Cloudberry Retreat
Alyssia Wong, Britney Krebs,, Vivan Pham, Rico del Moral
U.S.
JURY COMMENTS
The retreat for post-partum depression is sensitively sited in a rainforest clearing. Well-crafted drawings clearly show the proposal in the site. The forms work well at the site scale, but the intention at the scale of the interior is ambiguous: too large for the undisclosed numbers of inhabitants or the activities? lacking intimacy? These considerations are critical for a healing space.
-Sand Helsel
A very intriguing interpretation of a woman's post partum experience and how to make it more managable. A commendable effort.
-Sidra Khokhar
HONOURABLE MENTION
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JURY COMMENTS
Shortlisted Entries
Ready for the Island
Isabell Rehm, Julia Endler
Germany
Adaptive reuse is clearly evident in the interesting siting of this self-sustainable project within the silos of an abandon limestone quarry. This should have been enough to generate occupation and use that would be relevant to this particular site and make this an exciting project. Instead, too much program and prescriptive activity are overlaid, turning the proposal into a facility more like a theme park that relies on labelling functional spaces rather than generating atmosphere.
-Sand Helsel
Interesting methodology adapted of taking the concept of a retreat onto an urban level with multiple sensorial experiences being generated. The interstitial spaces and the semantic connections that have been developed with the aid of a strong narrative made the flow of the architectural progression of this project all the more interesting.
-Sidra Khokhar
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Retreat Center «SHI KHAN»
Diana Kanbekova, Alsu Galina
Russia
The author has a strong cultural appreciation of an important mountain landscape. What could have been a wonderful opportunity to develop this into an architectural project through section, embedded into the ground and the community, is unfortunately reduced to a roof outline, on a very conventional functional brief. More emphasis on views and atmospheres would have been a better way to develop the project than working drawings.
-Sand Helsel
A very interesting take on the integration and rejuvenation of culture and history. Well done!
-Sidra Khokhar
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Healing Hill
Zehra Ateş, Rasül Güngör, Emir Enbiya İşler, Esra Elüstü
Turkey
The Healing Hill is a megastructure domed timber roof that sits convincingly in the landscape. Depressions and openings deflect the pure geometry of the timber roof and form more intimate spaces that are well described through atmospheric sections.
-Sand Helsel
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Shangri La
Xinyi Hu, Wang Yuanling, Li Xuanying
China
Shangri-la responds to a conceptualised energy field created by mountains, rivers and caves. However the primal geometry and formalist language of the overall scheme can be seen as divorcing the proposal from the site, almost building a walled encampment. The individual elements of the project work well with refined interiors and sections that are well drawn.
-Sand Helsel
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Journey of Serenity
Gyeong Heejeong, Jo Gayoung, and Park Sunjae
South Korea
The project is buried in the terraces of rice paddies, and despite the program being unnecessarily sequential there is a clear understanding of the occupation of the overall site and the users’ movement through it, which is clearly drawn. The project is well-scale and appropriate. The weakest aspect is at the smaller scale and the ambiance of the built forms. The default seems to produce modernist white boxes with seemingly little consideration of other material or formal solutions.
-Sand Helsel
A good attempt. However, the originality of this scheme is questionable as I would have appreciated the architectural research to have gone into the detailings of the rice paddies and the experiential signifiance they may hold in terms of site context. The translation of a terraced site is nothing out of the ordinary.
-Sidra Khokhar
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Grottoscape-Healing Complex with Nature
Zhewen Wu, Jianpeng Bai, Di Wu
China
There is a lack of connection with the desire to heal and engage with nature with references to Buddhist grottos cut into mountains and the enclosed mega-block dropped into the centre of a Shanghai park with little consideration of the existing context. The program of humans and animals co-mingling in the interior is unbelievable and underdrawn.
-Sand Helsel
A very clever adaptation of the area's biotic environment within the architectural space. A big part of the human experience is linked with the ecosystem around us which is a great thing to see being catered to in this project.
-Sidra Khokhar
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KILYATOPIA
Gökçe Karabulut
Turkey
The focus on walls of various materials – stone and compressed earth – provides textures and atmospheres, and a potentially interesting strategy to engage with the site and the program. Instead of sculpting and retaining the ground as the primary move, the dominant reading of the walls are as party walls between double-storey units. This is a very competent design but it appears more like a resort than a retreat.
-Sand Helsel
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Into the Wild
Jian Liang
U.S.
The elements of earth, fire, water, etc are used quite literally to generate spaces in the project, but do create some interesting atmospheric elements. However the siting strategy in the flood plain of a major river system seems wilful and incoherent, spread out with little sense of scale. One would imagine that levees would assume their form from river flows and not Euclidean geometry, and that one would shelter and the project would contract during floods as opposed to drifting on tenuous floating platforms.
-Sand Helsel
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The Northern Retreat
Karri Paasovaara
Finland
There is a wonderful description of shadow and light in the text about this northern retreat. The author has interesting proposals for reflection of the sky on water and the mass of walls. These should have been the drivers for extraordinary spatial experiences throughout the whole project , but unfortunately they became reduced to a pool room within a very convention plan.
-Sand Helsel
A good attempt at understanding the concept of phenomenology, however, the project lacks innovation across the breadth of such a unique and vast site.
-Sidra Khokhar
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Mind Archeology
Lee seungho, Kwak Min Seok
South Korea
The project’s strategy for dealing with depression is innovative and creative, physically and conceptually embedding the retreat into the ground. An interesting series of diagrams explain the proposed actions on the site, and the program parallels the downward flow of the river. Sadly, this promising project is left as a diagram with little ambiance or materiality.
-Sand Helsel
The site and the concept being proposed are too far apart in terms of their relationship with each other. The overall visual appeal of the project has more potential to be explored in tandem with the natural elements which have been spoken about in the writeup.
-Sidra Khokhar
Organizers
