A tiny Vienna-based architecture firm has won the world's highest-paying architecture award, earning 150,000 euros for their groundbreaking social projects. Alex Hagner and Ulrike Schartner of Gaupenraub architecture studio received the inaugural Ammodo Architecture Award from a Dutch foundation, primarily for their innovative homeless shelter project "Vinzirast am Land" in Mayerling, Austria.
The call came on a Thursday from Amsterdam while Hagner was working in their office located in a historic railway arch in Vienna's Hütteldorf district. He had completely forgotten about their nomination for the new award. As he was still on the phone, a colleague whispered to him asking if he knew how much prize money was involved. The amount exceeded even the prestigious Pritzker Prize, making it the most lucrative architecture award in the world.
Hagner and Schartner have known about their victory since summer but are still in a state of disbelief. "In recent months, we had been asking ourselves whether we really took the right path," they explained. "Everything around us is developing, and we're still the small office." The Dutch Ammodo Foundation clearly disagreed, recognizing their innovative ideas with the substantial monetary award.
The joy is palpable in their railway arch office, which they chose in 2003 because of its proximity to water. Papier-mâché seagulls peer through the windows of the protected Otto Wagner vault structure toward the Wien River. Their creator, a former city planning department official and Vinzirast volunteer, later stops by with pastries. Schartner jokes that while she's happy with the water view, she's less pleased with the opposite riverbank wall, where Rapid Vienna soccer fans have immortalized themselves with their team colors.
The way potential clients react when entering their unconventional office has become a reliable indicator of whether they'll work together, according to Hagner. Those expecting a sleek loft in a modern building rather than a vault near Vienna's western entrance, with the U4 subway rattling overhead every few minutes, rarely become clients. This isn't a problem for the duo, who have stood for one principle since founding their firm in 1999: building with existing structures using available resources.
Twenty years ago, this approach wasn't fashionable at all. However, these are precisely the prerequisites for many social projects. "They can't build something big on a green field," Hagner explains. "Instead, they have to look for available space or buildings and figure out how to redesign them to make people want to work or live there." This philosophy has guided their work from the beginning.
In 2002, when the late priest Wolfgang Pucher had the idea of expanding his Graz Vinzidorf concept to Vienna, Hagner and Schartner reached out to him. They explained they had a small architecture firm and asked if he could use such services. His response was simple: "He needs everyone." To this day, the various Vinzi projects for homeless people are based on voluntary engagement.
Architecture plays a crucial role in these projects, as Hagner emphasizes: "We've learned that you can move money with design." This became particularly clear with the Vinzirast Mittendrin project on Währinger Straße, which emerged from an unusual alliance between students and homeless people during the Audimax occupation. The principle proved even more powerful with their recent Vinzirast am Land project in Mayerling, housed in Heinz Hanner's former Relais & Châteaux hotel.
"The bolder and more beautiful the plan, the greater people's enthusiasm to participate," the architects discovered. The massive photovoltaic system on the chicken coop was donated by a manufacturer from Carinthia who was impressed that they had dismantled an old building in Kamptal with students from HTL Mödling technical school, homeless individuals, and volunteers, then rebuilt it in Mayerling. The courtyard was presented at a quality pavers' conference, where participants spontaneously volunteered their services.
The prize money will make it easier to do what Hagner and Schartner constantly do anyway: explain their projects. Interest in architecture's social possibilities is growing, with students regularly reaching out. With the funds, they plan to build an open-source platform to share their experiences, including lessons like why it's not a good idea to hold public meetings when implementing homeless projects.
"Instead, you organize a flea market," Hagner suggests. "Because people come individually there. You can meet at table islands instead of opposing fronts. You can address fears, and over negotiations about a small pot, even critics sometimes sigh and offer their help, because it has to be somewhere, and this way they can at least help steer it."
This approach also helps find "local experts" who provide valuable input, Schartner adds. In Mayerling, for example, someone pointed out that a pilgrimage route passes by and that pilgrims might need rooms. Room rental has now become part of the project's sustainability model.
The duo may soon need their social skills and experience as subway tenants again for a new project: a hotel for people with disabilities under the U2 subway line in Vienna's Seestadt development. "We'd really like to get that going now too," Schartner says, indicating their continued commitment to barrier-breaking social architecture.
Gaupenraub architecture studio was founded in 1999 by Alex Hagner and Ulrike Schartner. The pair deliberately chooses not to participate in open competitions, instead donating their work to projects like Vinzirast. The Ammodo Architecture Awards were first given in 2024 by a Dutch foundation to promote and publicize socially and ecologically responsible architecture. The awards will be presented every two years going forward, recognizing architects who use their skills to address social challenges and environmental concerns.
