Tapestry prize looks for design to grace Phoenix Central Park

The Australian Tapestry Workshop has launched the 2021 Tapestry Design Prize for Architects.

The $10,000 prize challenges architects to design a site-specific tapestry for a hypothetical site, which in 2021 will be a choice of three galleries inside Phoenix Central Park by John Wardle Architects and Durbach Block Jaggers: the basement gallery, the double height gallery and the top floor gallery.

The prize is open to architects, architecture students and multi-discipline design teams worldwide. Entrants are asked to consider how tapestries can articulate, transform and enrich public and private space.

John Wardle Architects, who won the 2015 prize with his design Perspective on a Flat Surface, will be be on the judging panel, along with Cameron Bruhn (dean and head of the architecture school at the University of Queensland), Diane Jones (executive director of PTW Architects), Valerie Kirk (artist and tapestry weaver), Dimmity Walker (director of Spaceagency Architects) and interdisciplinary artist Brook Andrew.

Entries close on 7 June at 5 pm and the winner will announced at the Australian Tapestry Workshop on 26 August. A people’s choice winner will also receive $1,000.

An initiative of architect and former ATW board chair Peter Williams, the Tapestry Design Prize for Architects celebrates the long standing connection between architectural space and tapestry design.

The hypothetical sites for previous competitions have been the Australian Pavilion in Venice (2015), the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra (2016) and an unbuilt monumental cenotaph for physicist Isaac Newton drawn by the French neoclassical architect Étienne-Louis Boullée in the 18th century (2018).

Two of the winning tapestry designs have been made by the Australian Tapestry Workshop, including John Wardle Architects’ Perspective on a Flat Surface which was named joint winner in 2015 and Justin Hill’s 22 Temenggong Road, Twilight. The winner of the 2018 prize, Chaos and Fertility by Pop Architecture and Hotham Street Ladies is currently in production.

Entries to the 2021 prize close on 7 June at 5 pm and the winner will announced at the Australian Tapestry Workshop on 26 August. A people’s choice winner will also receive $1,000.

The 2021 Tapestry Design Prize for Architects is presented by the Australian Tapestry Workshop and supported by Architecture Media (publisher of ArchitectureAU.com), Metal Manufactures Limited, , Creative Victoria and the City of Port Phillip. The launch of the prize is part of the Asia Pacific Architecture Festival.