Deadline: September 25, 2026
2026 Jacques Rougerie Foundation International Architecture and Innovation Competition
Architecture & Spaces / Cash Prize / Job / Internship / Open to All / September / Trophy / Certificate38 views
Organizer
Fondation Jacques Rougerie – Académie des Beaux-Arts, under the honorary presidency of H.S.H. Prince Albert II of Monaco
Fondation Jacques Rougerie – Académie des Beaux-Arts, under the honorary presidency of H.S.H. Prince Albert II of Monaco
Location
International (Global)
International (Global)
Deadline
September 25, 2026
September 25, 2026
Competition Category
- Flood-Prone Lands – Prospective
- Flood-Prone Lands – LAB
- Sea – Prospective
- Sea – LAB
- Space – Prospective
- Space – LAB
Eligibility
Open to all. Open to students, professionals, researchers, creators, designers, artists, and others worldwide. No restrictions based on age, gender, nationality, or religion. Each participant may enter only once with a single project.
Open to all. Open to students, professionals, researchers, creators, designers, artists, and others worldwide. No restrictions based on age, gender, nationality, or religion. Each participant may enter only once with a single project.
Entry Fee
Free
Free
Prizes/Awards
Six International Grand Prizes will be awarded, each endowed with €7,000, for a total prize fund of €42,000. In addition to financial support, laureates will benefit from the Foundation's guidance to further develop their projects and may draw upon the Foundation's network of experts. Furthermore, with the joint support of Nhood, Ceetrus, and the Projex Group, participants have the opportunity to develop and realize a project around the theme "Building and Living with Water in the Dunkirk Territory, France."
Six International Grand Prizes will be awarded, each endowed with €7,000, for a total prize fund of €42,000. In addition to financial support, laureates will benefit from the Foundation's guidance to further develop their projects and may draw upon the Foundation's network of experts. Furthermore, with the joint support of Nhood, Ceetrus, and the Projex Group, participants have the opportunity to develop and realize a project around the theme "Building and Living with Water in the Dunkirk Territory, France."
Core Introduction
This competition invites participants to design new living environments across three realms where physical and environmental conditions redefine the act of building: flood-prone lands, marine/submarine environments, and outer space. In these unstable or hostile contexts, the challenge is not to dominate the environment but to design in harmony with it. The competition is structured around three major themes, each divided into two categories: Prospective and LAB.
This competition invites participants to design new living environments across three realms where physical and environmental conditions redefine the act of building: flood-prone lands, marine/submarine environments, and outer space. In these unstable or hostile contexts, the challenge is not to dominate the environment but to design in harmony with it. The competition is structured around three major themes, each divided into two categories: Prospective and LAB.
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Flood-Prone Lands: Inventing habitats and infrastructures that learn to live with water. Participants must address territories at the land-water interface — coastlines, estuaries, deltas, island areas — affected by rising sea levels. Open subject (free site selection) or proposed subject: "Building and Living with Water in the Dunkirk Area, France."
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Sea: Designing habitats and infrastructures to live in symbiosis with the sea. Projects must engage with specific physical constraints including swell, currents, tides, hydrostatic pressure, and salt corrosion through a systemic approach combining architecture, engineering, and ecology. Open subject, or proposed subjects: "Ocean Plastics: Transforming a Global Scourge into an Architectural Resource" / "Designing an Inhabited Marine and/or Underwater Base."
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Space: Imagining habitats and infrastructures capable of sustaining life and organizing resources. In the extreme environment of vacuum, radiation, and microgravity, architecture becomes a life-support system requiring autonomy, closed-loop cycles, modularity, and maintainability.
Created in 2009, the competition has received over 12,000 applications from 150 nationalities across five continents. The Foundation is dedicated to placing humanity and living systems at the heart of safe and desirable frameworks, turning constraints into resources and inventing new ways of inhabiting the Earth, the sea, and beyond — by bringing together art, science, and technology in close connection with nature.
