Background · earlier work

Convening the built environment — before certifications.

Urbanistas didn't start with certifications. It started by convening people around the built environment — organising international and national architectural competitions, exhibitions, and cultural events that brought architects, municipalities, and institutions together around how places get made.

That convening instinct — turning complexity into a shared, well-run process — is the same one we now bring to green-building certification. This is an archive of that earlier work.

Competitions & culture

Architectural competitions, exhibitions, and cultural programmes Urbanistas organised across Bulgaria.

New Centre of Borovets

International architectural competition · 2017

Organised the international competition for the new central area of Borovets — Bulgaria's oldest mountain resort (2.3 ha, ~€30M) — and developed the brief and documentation, with the Municipality of Samokov and the national architecture unions.

Etar Museum Hotel

National architectural competition · 2017

Organised the national competition to bring new life to Hotel Strannopriemnitsa at the Etar Open-Air Ethnographic Museum in Gabrovo, including the full brief and competition documentation.

Etar Museum Hotel — Exhibition

Exhibition & presentation · 2018

Curated the public exhibition of all competition entries and the winners' presentation at Soho Sofia, in partnership with the art co-working space.

New Visual Identity of Etar

Cultural event · 2017

Organised the event around the museum's new visual-identity competition, presenting the ongoing architectural competition for its hotel at Generator Sofia.

E-valuation

Arts competition & PR · 2020

Organisational partner and PR consultant for DA LAB Foundation's open call (supported by the Bulgarian Ministry of Culture) backing five digital artists — exhibited nationwide and at the DA Fest digital-arts festival.

Rita Justesen — Lecture & Discussion

Public lecture · 2018

Convened a lecture and jury discussion on planning and competitions with Rita Justesen, Director of Planning & Architecture at CPH City & Port Development, Copenhagen, alongside the Borovets competition jury.

A note on continuity: the same convening and process discipline behind these projects is what we now apply to LEED, BREEAM, WELL and EDGE certification.

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