Living Places – Simon Architecture Prize
Dezeen Competitions: the Simon Architecture Prize calls for work demonstrating how architectural spaces can improve the quality of people’s day-to-day lives.
Proposed spaces can include interiors, public spaces and landscaping, and should be communicated via video.
This competition is now closed
Organiser: Simon, curated by Fundació Mies van der Rohe
Competition: Simon Architecture Prize
Judges:
- Fernanda Canales, architect and researcher, Mexico City
- Benjamín Iborra, architect and creative director at Mesura
- Sesi Bergeret, filmmaker, programmer and cultural manager, Barcelona
- Wojciech Mazan, architect, editor of Rzut and co-founder of Prolog
- Salvi Plaja, industrial designer, global chief design officer at Simon and President of FAD
Submission deadline: 5 October 2026
Winner announcement: December 2026
Prizes: the winning projects will each receive a €10,000 cash prize. In addition, winners and finalists will receive an exclusive piece presented at the award ceremony
Competition overview
The Living Places – Simon Architecture Prize, curated by Fundació Mies van der Rohe, is open for entries to its sixth edition.
Consolidated as an international reference, this year’s awards are also part of the agenda of Barcelona 2026 World Capital of Architecture.
This award is distinguished by incorporating video as an essential tool for communicating architecture projects, including interiors, public spaces and landscaping, whose excellence enhances spaces’ ability to provide comfort to their inhabitants.
Proposals must improve the quality of people’s day-to-day lives: for working, learning, sharing, and for having fun.
Eligibility and judging criteria
Participants from all European countries, and Mexico, Brazil and Morocco, are eligible to enter.
The project must be completed and put into use between 1 January 2024 and 31 December 2025. The work must be in use, meaning it has been handed over to its users and is actively occupied.
Entries may be submitted by the architects responsible for the project, either individually or as part of a multidisciplinary team with at least one architect.
Each applicant may register up to four projects. Participation is free of charge.
The prize recognises adaptable spaces, which enhance wellbeing and are comfortable. Proposals must enhance people’s everyday lives: for working, learning, playing.
How to enter
Projects must first be pre-registered via simonprize.org. Project authors are then invited to complete the online registration.
Submission deadlines
The deadline for sending proposals is 5 October 2026.
Announcement of the finalists will be in December 2026. In February 2026, the winners’ award ceremony takes place.
About The Simon Group
The Simon Group is an industrial group specialising in technological solutions for lighting, light control, connectivity and electrical materials for contract and residential projects.
Its team is made up of 4,000 people from around the world, and has establishments in 15 countries, nine of which have production centres.
The organisation understands spaces as the centre of its users’ experiences, and offers them the possibility of filling them with light, creating atmospheres that invite sensations, for touching, seeing, hearing and feeling.
With its technology, it is able to create countless experiences that adapt to the user’s pace of life.
Images taken from Geometry Hunter film, produced by the Simon Prize. Photographs by Matilda Vidal de Llobatera.
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