The 2026 Mies van der Rohe Award has been granted to the revitalization of the Charleroi Palais des Expositions, a sprawling 1950s convention center in Belgium. The project, led by architecture studios AgwA and Architecten Jan de Vylder Inge Vinck, represents a seven-year effort to reactivate a 50,000-square-meter relic of mid-century modernism. By selecting this project, the jury signals a clear shift in the architectural zeitgeist, favoring the surgical repair of existing structures over the carbon-intensive impulse to build anew.
The original 1954 building was a monument to industrial-era scale, but it had grown increasingly disconnected from the modern urban fabric. Rather than proposing a total overhaul, the design team opted for a "bold yet resourceful" approach that worked within the building’s inherent constraints. The intervention involved stripping back certain facades and selectively removing elements to unlock new spatial possibilities, effectively turning the vast, monolithic site into a more porous and social environment.
In its citation, the jury praised the project for demonstrating how architecture can turn scarcity into opportunity. By treating "repair" as a powerful design strategy, the architects have managed to preserve the historical weight of the Palais while adapting it for contemporary use. It is an exercise in restraint that suggests the future of European urbanism lies not in the spectacle of new forms, but in the intelligent stewardship of the structures we already have.
With reporting from *Dezeen Architecture*.
Source · Dezeen Architecture
