Lisbon Architecture Triennale: Jimenez Lai of Chicago architecture studio Bureau Spectacular has won the inaugural Lisbon Triennale Début Award, presented to an architect under 35 in recognition of an outstanding career so far.
The architect saw off competition from a ten-strong shortlist, including New York office SO-IL and London studio Assemble, to win the €5000 prize, which was announced at a ceremony last night as part of the Lisbon Architecture Triennale 2013.
Lai founded Bureau Spectacular in 2008. Since then the studio has worked on projects such as Phalanstery Module, a rotating exhibition space for a zero-gravity environment, and Speechbuster, an outdoor table that transforms into a collection of street furniture.
Other projects include White Elephant, an exhibition space imagined as a cross between furniture and a small house, and Giant Urban Toys, a proposal to install games in the vacant plots of American cities.
"There's something to be said about being young and ambitious," said Lai during the ceremony.
The jury for the award included triennale curator Beatrice Galilee, Mexican architect Tatiana Bilbao and Eva Franch of non-profit organisation Storefront for Art and Architecture.
The Lisbon Architecture Triennale 2013 kicked off this week in the Portuguese capital. Other projects at the exhibition include garments made by dunking people in wax and an austere concrete pavilion.
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