Inside has announced the shortlist of 77 projects that will compete to be crowned World Interior of the Year 2018.

Projects from across the globe were entered across nine diverse categories, ranging from health and educational buildings to hotels, bars and restaurants, and residential homes. Hosted alongside the World Festival (WAF), the event attracts more than 2,000 attendees each year for its three days of talks, awards, exhibitions and fringe events. Shortlisted designers reflect the global reach of the awards and include WATG and Wimberly Interiors (Turkey), Genius Loci (Indonesia) BIG – Bjarke Ingels Group (Denmark) and Studio Chris Fox (Australia), Shanwei Weng (China), Beijing.

Chapman Taylor with , the sole studio based in Italy, has been shortlisted for the intervention of urban requalification of the industrial district of Bolzano: NOI Techpark in Bolzano in Italy is a melting pot of research & enterprises in Food Technology, Automation, Green & Alpine Technologies. Park is located in the ex-Montecatini factories, becoming a great example of industrial archeology reuse. This was a negleted area of the city, which felt into disuse for 30 years: this reconversion gives back to the citizens a public space chatacterized by innovation, research and new entrepreneurship . The ex-Montecatini areas, in the industrial district of Bolzano, are tangible pieces of history (of the town and its society) which appear to be frozen in time.

In the display category, , based in London and run by Marco Poletto and Claudia Pasquero, has been selected for H.O.R.T.U.S. their display at Bio.Tech Hut a future city algae farming, where new species of micro-organisms are domesticated in Astana, Kazakhstan.

H.O.R.T.U.S is an art work produced specifically for the bio-tech hut exhibition on the 4th floor of the main pavilion of Astana EXPO 2017. ecoLogicStudio designed, manufactured, assembled and installed the artwork based on the specifications of the piece named HORTUS ZKM and now part of the permanent collection of the ZKM museum in Karlsruhe; this piece was specifically re-designed to fit the oxygenating room in the Home Hut.

 

NOI Techpark in Bolzano

 

Bio.Tech Hut Photo credit ©NAARO

 

, Programme Director of commented on this year's shortlist: “Once again our finalist judges will have a wealth of good interiors to consider, and it will be a treat to listen to the designers present their ideas live to our international juries and delegates. This was a pleasing entry in terms both of geographical spread and range of project types.”

Fenghemuchen Space Design (China) and Department of Architecture Co (Thailand) were amongst those with the most shortlisted projects. The largest number of projects within the shortlist are based in China (20%), and mainly within the bars and restaurant category, followed by Australia (12%) and Taiwan (9%).

All nominees at the World Festival of Interiors 2018 will present their projects to distinguished international juries that include Nigel Coates, and Lyndon Neri, Neri & Hu, during the Festival to compete for one of the nine INSIDE category awards. Open to all festival attendees, the presentations are followed by a live exchange between the designers and jurors. The overall winner of the ‘World Interior of the Year' will be announced at an exclusive gala dinner on 30 November at the Beurs van Berlage.

 

Discover more about Inside World Festival of Interiors 2018 here