What makes a good building in 2024? The most obvious answer might come down to form, and indeed, many of our top picks experimented with daring geometry. Take the sinuous extension of Bloomingdale International School in India, designed by andblack studio, which envelopes its students under an undulating green roof. Material expression is another metric by which to measure a building’s success, the year’s best architecture had it in spades. The Zebun Nessa Mosque in Dhaka, Bangladesh, for instance, utilizes a perforated pink concrete façade to differentiate itself from its industrial context. And in China, Kengo Kuma aptly clad the sculptural UCCA Clay Museum in 3,600 handmade tiles to striking effect.

Looks aren’t everything: Projects that promote social good always earn top marks from our editors. There is perhaps no better example than Hope Street, a rehabilitation facility for women serving short sentences in Southampton, UK, that brings a sense of humanity to the justice system by keeping families together. Two projects — the Tekαkαpimək Contact Station in Maine and təməsew̓txʷ Aquatic and Community Centre in British Columbia — also teach important lessons about engaging Indigenous groups in the design of our built environment, communities that have been historically excluded from this process.

As we continue to grapple with the impacts of climate change, sustainability remains top of mind. The rise of mass timber architecture is reflected in our list of favourite projects, including the California College of the Arts Expansion by Studio Gang whose exposed bracing system is elegantly expressed on the exterior. And we highlight the Pumphouse, an adaptive reuse project (and AZ Award winner) that makes clever use of a heritage structure in Winnipeg, exemplifying the adage that the most sustainable building is the one that already exists.

Of course, many of the projects below succeed on all fronts — form, material expression, social good and sustainability — which earned them a coveted spot on the list.

Our full list of the best architecture projects of 2024 includes:

• Cocoon Pre-primary Extension, Vijayawada, India by andblack design studio
• Pumphouse, Winnipeg by 5468796 Architecture
• Le Pavilion Jardins, Paris by Atelier du Pont
• Hope Street, Southampton, UK by Snug Architects
• təməsew̓txʷ Aquatic and Community Centre, New Westminster, Canada by hcma
• Zebun Nessa Mosque, Dhaka, Bangladesh by Studio Morphogenesis
• California College of the Arts Expansion, San Francisco by Studio Gang
• Rwanda Institute for Conservation Agriculture by MASS Design Group
• UCCA Clay Museum, Yixing, China by Kengo Kuma
• Tekαkαpimək Contact Station, Maine by Saunders Architecture

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Cocoon Pre-primary Extension, India by andblack design studio

In early education, a major milestone of any young scholar’s life is unlocking the power of shapes. From triangles to rectangles to circles, form is exciting and new. So, what better way to learn about these essential building blocks than through the design of the school itself? In Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh, India, the pre-primary extension of Bloomingdale International School boasts a uniquely undulating form: a dynamic green roof built using parametric design that flows over glass-walled classrooms. Named Cocoon, this pre-primary school truly enrobes its students in learning. 

Designed by local architecture firm andblack design studio, the 372-square-metre extension accommodates approximately 100 preschool students for indoor and outdoor education. With the growing green roof, open sightlines and a clear connection to the nearby verdant courtyard — thanks to large windows and a series of skylights — Cocoon brings the outside in. In an area where traditional schooling systems dominate, this design is a breath of fresh air.

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Pumphouse, Winnipeg by 5468796 Architecture

Having faced an uncertain future for nearly 40 years, the James Avenue Pumping Station in Winnipeg is now the foundation for a brilliant mixed-use development that brings both housing and commercial space to a pivotal site in Winnipeg. Originally built in 1906, the low-slung edifice served the city’s fire brigade with its hulking high-pressure water system for 80 years before its closure in 1986; despite receiving a heritage designation in 1982, the building was left to languish after more than a dozen proposals for rehabilitation failed for one reason or another. But where many may have seen a lost cause, local firm 5468796 Architecture saw opportunity.

Devising a conceptual design and financial pro forma before it even had a commission, the team at 5468796 – led by partners Sasa Radulovic, Johanna Hurme and Colin Neufeld – proposed a two-pronged intervention: the rehabilitation of the heritage building for commercial use and the development of two contemporary multi-unit residences to bookend that refurbished structure. To achieve the first, the architects made use of the building’s existing gantry crane, leveraging its stupendous strength to suspend a new “floating floor” for sleek office spaces and a restaurant over the pump hall’s impressive machinery, which remains intact and viewable. Large skylights in the new roof and floor-to-ceiling glazing help funnel natural light deep into the resurrected space and throughout the new amenities.

Standing on either side of the restored facility are the two new-build residential buildings, each lifted off the ground by elegant iron columns and set back from the pump house to a degree that allows for pedestrian lanes to circulate between the volumes. Clad in striking black metal, the mid-rise structures incorporate a fresh approach to multi-family housing with open-air egress and a “skip-stop” configuration that allows for dual-aspect shotgun apartments, maximizing daylight and cross-ventilation in every unit (70 in the building to the west and 28 in the one on the east). A century-old nail laminated timber (NLT) technology was used to form the interior floors and ceilings, instilling warmth while also nodding to the older warehouses in the area. Since units are accessed via open-air corridors, moments of neighbourly front porch-style interactions are inevitable and will help instill a sense of community. Once a neglected brick-clad relic of the past, the Pumphouse by 5468796 is now a stunning multi-volume complex that respect its heritage while ushering in a vibrant new life and purpose.  

Read our original feature about the Pumphouse from June 2024.

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Le Pavilion Jardins, Paris by Atelier du Pont

Originally designed over 40 years ago by architect Bernard Tschumi, the Parc de la Villette in Paris reimagined what an urban park could be. The deconstructivist masterplan features 26 world-famous Folies (striking red structures scattered across the landscape in distinctive architectural configurations). Recently, the park played host to the 2024 Paris Olympics and Paralympics athletes celebration. It stands to reason then, in the midst of all this grandeur, that its facilities were due for an upgrade. 

Designed by architecture and interior design firm Atelier du Pont, Le Pavilion Jardins is a new base camp in the heart of Parc de la Villette for maintenance workers and park operators. The new build accommodates over 155 workstations that were previously housed in a series of 1980s prefabs in various states of disrepair. By reallocating this 3,000-square-metre plot of land, Atelier du Pont was able to return 5,000-square-metres of green space back to the public park. 

Inside, the bright, geometric interiors are full of natural light and dynamic, checkerboard shadows from the wooden interlocking roof structure. Designed to marry the strength of concrete with the lightness of wood, this breathable slatted roof is a study in solid, elegant design — not to mention a home for growing pink wildflowers.

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Hope Street, Southampton by Snug Architects

Correctional facilities have a bad record when it comes to design. Their architecture is punitive by nature, facilitating surveillance and submission over meaningful opportunities for rehabilitation. Hope Street, the winner of this year’s RIBA MacEwan Award is a radical alternative. Located in Southampton, the facility for women serving short-term sentences was designed by Snug Architects with a trauma-informed approach. It starts with a residential-inspired design language that aims to foster trust in a demographic often skeptical of state institutions. The street elevation reads as a cluster of three brick-clad houses, breaking down the otherwise imposing form into a more human scale. Even the front door handle, a round wooden knob, was selected for its familiar quality.

Inside, Snug Architects took care to eliminate common triggers, including CCTV and security checkpoints, based on consultations with those with lived experience in the prison system. Though the facility is staffed 24 hours per day, natural surveillance is balanced with privacy through careful spatial planning, allowing women to move freely and feel at home. Warm, generous and filled with natural light, the interiors were inspired by the hospitality-driven design of Maggie’s Centres. Deep CLT walls convey a fortress-like sense of safety, contrasted by ample glazing that allows for clear sightlines and a sense of openness. The architects even considered acoustics to make women more comfortable disclosing sensitive information.

Keeping families together (where deemed appropriate) is one of Hope Street’s primary objectives. Ordinarily, women in Southampton serve their sentences over 100 kilometres from home, often forcing their children into foster care. Instead, the facility’s shared flats, organized around a landscaped courtyard, can accommodate up to 24 women with their children; the house next door serves as a nursery. At the end of their stay, residents can move to one of the organization’s Hope Houses for continued support in preparation for their return home. “Hope Street is the only project that almost had me crying… we hear of the architect as being a doctor of space and this is an example of architecture that is healing people,” said MacEwan Award judge Alex Scott-Whitby.

Read our original feature about Hope Street from February 2024.

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təməsew̓txʷ Aquatic and Community Centre, New Westminster by hcma

Truth and reconciliation are at the heart of this aquatic centre in New Westminster, BC. Its design, by Vancouver firm hcma architecture + design, began with a lengthy community engagement phase that solicited input from locals, including Indigenous groups, to ensure the building would serve the public better than its predecessor (which was beloved by high-performance athletes but otherwise not well used). To that end, hcma merged the aquatic and community centres that once sat on the site as separate entities. “[The city] said, ‘We want this to be a de facto living room of the community,’” hcma principal Paul Fast told us in our original coverage of the project.

While the black metal-clad façade asserts a bold civic presence on the public plaza, inside, the təməsewt̓xw Aquatic and Community Centre delivers a warm welcome, courtesy of its hybrid mass timber structure composed of local glulam, concrete and steel (gifted by the local Indigenous community, the building’s name translates to “sea otter house”). Social spaces are spread throughout the centre, creating opportunities for Indigenous storytelling and celebration; the gymnasium, for instance, considers proper ventilation for smudging ceremonies.

The aquatic spaces — which include an eight-lane competition lap pool, a leisure pool with a lazy river and two hot pools — feel appropriately monumental in scale. Through the expansive floor-to-ceiling windows, which filter in aethereal natural light, they maintain a close connection to the landscape, which was revitalized by PFS Studio in an effort to restore the ravine that once defined the site (but was backfilled to make way for the original facilities in the 60s). It is this deep respect for the land and its inhabitants that sets this building apart as a beacon for thoughtful, sustainable design.

Read our original feature about the təməsew̓txʷ Aquatic and Community Centre from October 2024.

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Zebun Nessa Mosque, Dhaka, Bangladesh by Studio Morphogenesis

Creating a spiritual setting in an industrial area is no easy task — yet that was the challenge that Studio Morphogenesis took on while designing Zebun Nessa Mosque. Granted, it helps that the site the firm was working with lies next to a large pond. Yet leveraging this waterfront location to create a calm sanctuary for the surrounding worker community required the designers to make a very deliberate departure from the area’s dominant building style. Hence the mosque’s pink concrete façade, which stands in warm contrast to the grey mid-rises that surround it. The curved (and in some cases, arched) walls that enclose the building’s central dome are another swerve away from the hard-edged norm, while perforations within these surfaces work to create a comfortable airiness, allowing cool breezes to flow off the water and into the inner prayer hall. (Perforations in the metal doors also support effective wind flow during monsoon season.)

By enclosing the mosque’s circular dome within a square shell, the studio forms four corner gardens, each planted with a selection of native plants that contribute to the site’s pleasant microclimate. In one of these courtyards, a curving staircase ascends to a mezzanine prayer and social space reserved for women. (That particular focus of the project inspired the building’s name, which honours the land owner’s late mother.) Inside the main prayer hall below, a sculptural glass panel indicates the qibla direction of prayer, while openings frame views of the water beyond. And sandwiched between the core building and an outer wall that runs along the southern edge of the site, an arched auxiliary structure shelters an outdoor ablution area. Here, the project’s mosaic flooring (made using red cement and locally sourced broken pieces of brick in a nod to vernacular construction techniques) transitions from red to turquoise to represent tranquility. Yet the serenity is not just symbolic, either: in a perfect blend of spirituality and sustainability, water from the ablution area also flows into the garden.

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California College of the Arts Expansion, San Francisco by Studio Gang

Although mass timber buildings have become increasingly sophisticated — and increasingly common — over the last two decades, even the most sophisticated institutional designs tend to be limited by awkward proportions and constrained floor spans, with the weight and robust presence of wood at once a highlight and a hindrance. In San Francisco, however, Studio Gang’s new expansion project for the California College of the Arts turns the limits of mass timber into a bold and graceful aesthetic signature.

Built to meet carbon neutrality and net-zero energy standards, the 7,646-square-metre intervention expands an existing campus building with a striking pair of exposed mass timber pavilions, which emerge from a shared concrete terrace. Perforated by a pair of courtyards, the single-story concrete base hosts a sociable ground floor program — including large-scale maker workshops and fabrication studios — and is topped by an accessible green roof plaza. The pavilions, meanwhile, are home to smaller classrooms and art studios, which enjoy indoor-outdoor space. An x-shaped bracing system is the structural cherry on top. Combining steel and blackened wood, the exoskeleton facilitates more open interiors — and lends the forms an elegant finishing touch.

Read our original feature about the California College of the Arts Expansion from November 2024.

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Rwanda Institute for Conservation Agriculture by MASS Design Group

For MASS Design Group, the carbon budget is the one that really counts. In projects around the world, the global firm has led the way with carbon-positive design; projects that actually remove more greenhouse gases from the atmosphere than their construction and operation emit. And in East Africa, the architects have unveiled the first such university campus in the world, the Rwanda Institute for Conservation Agriculture.

On a lakeside site southeast of the national capital of Kigali, the 1,375-hectare campus was designed to utilize low-carbon locally sourced materials, particularly timber and earth. Similarly, the build was organized around up-skilling the local labour force via sustainable construction practices— with women accounting for 16 per cent of the workforce — helping ensure that 90 per cent of the construction budget was spent in the region. While the campus combines low embodied energy with natural ventilation and a pedestrian-oriented plan, the construction process was paired with an ongoing large-scale reforestation effort, which will contribute to a carbon-positive build. Throughout the campus, MASS Design Group collaborated with local artisans and craftspeople to design custom furnishings, fixtures and lighting installations. The result is a stirring global precedent — and a complex profoundly of its place.

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UCCA Clay Museum, Yixing, China by Kengo Kuma

“A mountain of pottery,” the UCCA Clay Museum in Yixing honours the craftsmanship of this Chinese ceramic capital. Kengo Kuma draped the sinuous structure in 3,600 handmade tiles glazed in tones ranging from dark to light in order to catch the changing sunlight throughout the day. The 3,440-square-metre building, an homage both to the Shushan Mountain in the distance and to the traditional dragon kiln (which has been in operation for six centuries), has a porous form that alternately crests and dips down, touching ground in an array of circular ponds. Its openness – visitors can traverse it through arches and voids – fosters a relationship with the clay production factories that surround it.

Inside, the structure reveals itself with a grandness befitting its exuberant outward expression. An inverted shell structure “carved by virtual spheres,” the roof is supported by four layers of wooden lattice beams that are illuminated to maximum effect. As the architects say, “This light yet strong wooden structure brings dynamic changes to the interior space and draws the line of sight and circulation flow deeper into the building.” Inside, visitors encounter exhibition halls, a lecture hall, a small stage, a coffee shop and other amenities.

As part of UCCA’s growing collection of buildings by major architects across China, the UCCA Clay Museum in Yixing joins a campaign of promoting ceramic craft that has been around for a millennium. It’s a stunning showcase for the power and perseverance of artisanal industry. 

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Tekαkαpimək Contact Station, Maine by Saunders Architecture

With its soaring wings cantilevering over the tree canopy, the Tekαkαpimək Contact Station is a wonderful 735-square-metre building and 9.3-hectare site atop Lookout Mountain. Located within the present and traditional homeland of the Penobscot Nation, the building is the first permanent visitor contact station in the area, a gateway for visitors that deeply immerses them in nature – “as far as one can see,” as the word Tekαkαpimək means. 

It was designed by Norway-based Canadian architect Todd Saunders through deep engagement with the Indigenous stewards of this land. (In fact, the firm went back to the drawing board after the team behind the project presented the first concept to the Wabanaki Nations.) “It intentionally incorporates cultural narratives, languages, images, kinship relations, ancestral representations, contemporary practices, and native materials of these lands and waters,” the firm explains.

Clad in horizontal bands of rough-sawn cedar planks, the building features a materiality that allows it to nestle into the Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument. Inside, the walls are lined in Douglas fir and the exhibition spaces showcase works by Indigenous artists, all cultural content and intellectual property that will forever remain in the hands of the Wabanaki Nations. Fully off grid, making use of solar power and passive strategies, the building is a monument to Indigineity and to the wonders of nature.

All Wabanaki Cultural Knowledge and Intellectual Property shared within this project is owned by the Wabanaki Nations listed above.