Wellbeing by means of architectural interventions was theme for the inaugural OBEL AWARD. At its best, as well as at its worst, architecture is all-encompassing which the jury described thus: “Architecture has an enormous impact on the conditions of individual and social life, on the self-awareness of people, on the public sphere, on education, science, economics and politics, on the environment, and on the future developments of all these. Architecture is not only able to contribute to sustainable developments. It is able to design the world of the people as a whole”.
In particular, architecture’s ability to impact on both the physical and mental wellbeing of people – by design and by making informed uses of all four dimensions – is an issue that deserves continuous discussion, attention, and self-questioning among the architectural professions. We will hear two lecture-style talks of divergent yet overlapping approaches to wellbeing through architectural interventions.
