On Friday 26 June, the winners of the 40th edition of the Archiprix NL were announced. Charlotte van der Woude (alumna Landscape architecture) won (shared) first prize for her project ‘Nature Is Under Your Feet’. Paul Kuipers (alumnus Architecture) received an honourable mention for his project ‘Het Achterhuis, a place to hide for Edward Snowden’. Another honourable mention was for Patrick Roegiers with his project ‘A Sense of Home’ (alumnus Architecture). This year's announcement of the winners took place at Het Nieuwe Instituut and could also be followed via a live stream on YouTube.

Charlotte van der Woude - Nature Is Under Your Feet
As a result of ever-expanding cities, the original subterranean landscape’s rivers and soil have been covered and can hardly be experienced. Reconnecting with these hidden structures could be a chance to create ‘new nature’ in the city, one that can facilitate a whole new type of habitat: a fragile nature to be discovered under your feet.

Paul Kuipers - Het Achterhuis, a place to hide for Edward Snowden
Het Achterhuis is a spatial manifesto to address the importance of transparency, a fundamental digit in our democratic system. Het Achterhuis, connecting the Herengracht and Keizersgracht, is a residence and hiding place for Edward Snowden, while it simultaneously functions as a server with public and collective programmes.  It is both a building and alleyway, both a wall and park, both a house and city.

Patrick Roegiers - A Sense of Home
If architects listen, observe and collaborate, architecture is no longer a goal in itself, but an element that fosters social connection. This project is an experiment to improve the sense of home for the homeless, who view their neighbourhood as home, but rooms are missing in their ‘house’. Adding new rooms in the interspaces of Amsterdam, using waste and residual streams, can strengthen the existing local networks.

The jury
This year the jury consisted of Frans Beavers, Ira Koers, Mascha Onderwater, Merel Pit and Jeroen Zuidgeest.

Archiprix NL
The Archiprix foundation is a partnership of Dutch educational institutions in the fields of architecture, urbanism and landscape architecture in Amsterdam, Arnhem, Delft, Eindhoven, Groningen, Maastricht, Rotterdam, Tilburg and Wageningen. Archiprix presents the best graduation projects from these study programmes annually. All 30 projects submitted are presented at www.archiprix.nl. The other winners can also be found here.