Text: Jan Henderson

The sixth annual Artists in Concrete Awards (AICA) Festival was held in early February in Pune, India. AICA Fest was inaugurated by Dr Ken Yeang from Malaysia and Professor Juhani Pallasmaa from Helsinki, Finland. Over the three days, the Awards celebrated excellence in architecture, landscape and interior design through a competition, speaker series and exhibition. This year the only Australian to be invited as speaker and juror was Adam Haddow, a director from SJB Architecture in Sydney.

Haddow was among 14 architecture, design and academic professionals from around the world invited to adjudicate at the awards that included Juhani Pallasmaa (Finland), Jo Noero (South Africa), Edward Hollis (Scotland), Ravi Hazra (India), Roberto Capecci (Italy) and Frazer Hay (Singapore). The Awards feature 11 categories including residential, commercial, civic, and community and cultural buildings.

Winners in the Interiors section were:

• DBTA International Pte Ltd, Amanora Club House
• Oscar and Ponni Architects, Accord Puducherry 5-Star Hotel
• Sanjay Puri Architects, Auriga
• Shailee Trivedi, Seth Buildcon
• Architect Vistasp and Associates, PI Industries, and
• KNS Architects, Minimalism.

And the Architecture category:

• Vivek Bhole Architects, Mount Abu University
• Creative Group, Chennai Airport
• Sunil Patil and Associates, Winery at Akluj
• Mahendra Chavan Associates, 7-Star Multiplex
• Sanjay Puri Architects, Bombay Arts Society
• Madhav Joshi and Associates, HPCC and CCCR at IITM
• Sanjay Puri Architects, 72 Screen
• Uneven Square, Cloud 9
• Chang Architects, Concreting Paradise, and
• Sikchi Associates, Aamrai Bungalow.