2020 in architecture

Events

• November 16 – Work to dismantle the flanking walls of a pavilion erected by Tadao Ando at Piccadilly Gardens in Manchester city centre in England begins.

Buildings and structures

• Australia 108, the tallest building in Melbourne, completed.
• Crown Sydney, the tallest building in Sydney, completed.

• Alex guesthouse, Berlare, designed by Atelier Vens Vanbelle, completed.

• Vancouver House, designed by Bjarke Ingels.

• Berlin Brandenburg Airport completed and opened on 31 October.

• M+ museum scheduled for completion.

• World One in Mumbai, the tallest building in India, is completed.

• Genoa-Saint George Bridge by Renzo Piano, over the Polcevera River in Genoa, replacing the Ponte Morandi which collapsed in 2018, completed and open to traffic on 3 August.

• The Kadokawa Culture Museum at Tokorozawa Sakura Town in Tokorozawa, Japan partially opened on 1 August and then fully opened on 6 November.

• Stone Garden, Beirut, designed by Lina Gotmeh, completed.

• Torres Obispado in Monterrey, the tallest skyscraper in Latin America, completed.
• 'OUM Wellness', built by the consortium Edificios Cero Energía in San Pedro Garza García, Nuevo León, the first net-zero energy building (NZEB) in Latin America.

• Powerhouse Telemark, "energy positive" project in Porsgrunn designed by Snøhetta.

• Nanjing Zendai Himalayas Center, designed by Ma Yansong.
• 1000 Trees, designed by Thomas Heatherwick in Shanghai.
• "Crystal" skyway at Raffles City Chongqing, designed by Moshe Safdie, opened to public June.

• Norra Tornen, a pair of residential buildings in Stockholm designed by OMA, is completed

• Tainan Spring, Tainan, designed by MVRDV, completed.

• The Opus, Dubai, including a boutique hotel with interiors designed by Zaha Hadid.
• Singapore Pavilion at Expo 2020 in Dubai.

• 100 Liverpool Street office redevelopment in the City of London, designed by Hopkins Architects.
• Hackney New Primary School and 333 Kingsland Road, East London, designed by Henley Halebrown, completed.
• Newfoundland Quay diagrid skyscraper rental apartments in London Docklands, designed by Horden Cherry Lee, projected for completion.
• Town House, combining a library and dance studios, Kingston University London, designed by Grafton Architects, opened to students 6 January.
• Wolfson Building, John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford, designed by Francis-Jones Morehen Thorp, opened 5 March.
• Falkirk Campus, Forth Valley College, Scotland, designed by Reiach & Hall, officially opened January.

Awards

• AIA Gold Medal – Marlon Blackwell
• Architecture Firm Award AIA – Architecture Research Office
• Driehaus Architecture Prize for New Classical Architecture – Ong-ard Satrabhandhu
• Grand Prix de l'urbanisme –
• Grand Prix national de l'architecture –
• LEAF Award, Overall Winner – Postponed until October 2021
• Praemium Imperiale Architecture Laureate –
• Pritzker Architecture Prize – Yvonne Farrell and Shelley McNamara
• RAIA Gold Medal – John Wardle
• RIAS Award for Architecture – cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic
• RIBA Royal Gold Medal – Grafton Architects
• Stirling Prize – RIBA announced that the Stirling Prize awards had been postponed until 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Thomas Jefferson Medal in Architecture – WEISS/MANFREDI
• Twenty-five Year Award AIA – Eric Owen Moss Architects for Conjunctive Points – The New City

Exhibitions

• 20 February until 14 August – Rem Koolhaas and AMO: "Countryside; the Future" at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City.

Deaths

• February 21 – Yona Friedman, 96, Hungarian-born French architect and architectural theorist
• March 15 – Vittorio Gregotti, 92, Italian architect
• March 26 – Michael Sorkin, 71, American architect
• March 28 – Michael McKinnell, 84, American architect
• April 4 – Bashirul Haq, 77, Bangladeshi architect
• April 10 – Rifat Chadirji, 93, Iraqi architect
• April 12 – Justus Dahinden, 94, Swiss architect, teacher and writer
• August 4 – Jean-Marc Bonfils, 57, Lebanese architect
• September 2 – Christian Liaigre, 77, French architect and interior designer
• December 27 – Vikram Lall - Indian architect,
• December 29 – Luigi Snozzi, 88, Swiss architect