| updated, August 2000 | UIA | |
The international jury composed of Dominique Perrault (France), Robert Berkebile (USA), Randolph R. Croxton (USA) and Henry N. Cobb (USA) met on 10 May 1996 in Minneapolis (USA).
For the 1996 session, two prizes were awarded to architects, one for a commercial project and the other for a residential one. The jury selected the following eight finalists:
Commercial buildings:
Residential buildings:
In the commercial buildings category, the jury presented the award to the architects of Bruder DWL (USA) for the Phoenix Central Library (Arizona). Considered as a technical feat in its use of laminated glass, the library highlights the performances of this material and its novel architectural possibilities. As a place of study, the building is also a reflection on the very idea of a library, based on notions of shelter, transparence and light.
In the residential buildings category, the award goes to Simon Foxell for the design of a glass pavilion set in the gardens of a private residence in Highgate, North London.
Implanted in a protected environment whose qualities it respects, the pavilion declines vertically and horizontally in structure, pannelling and roofing, made possible by the properties of laminated glass that extensively demonstrate its transparence, opacity and strength despite its apparent fragility.
Three prizes were awarded to students:
1st Prize: Romek Rutkowski and Wojtek Szlarczyk (Technical University of Wroclaw, Poland)
2nd Prize: Simo Jaakko Hassi (Tampere University of Technology, Finland)
3rd Prize: Debbie Kuh (University of Western Australia)
The 1996 Benedictus Awards were officially presented to the winners during the XIX World Congress of the International Union of Architects in Barcelona (Spain) on the "Night of Awards", 4 July 1996.