Economist Cris Ballester Parets has been awarded the 2024 Royal Academy Architecture Prize for her portfolio of sustainable social housing developments in the Balearic Islands.
The annual Royal Academy Architecture Prize, which is now in its sixth year, recognises winners for their "substantial contribution to the public and a commitment to excellence in architecture and design".
This year, the prize was given to Ballester Parets for developing an "extraordinary model" for social housing.
"The 2024 RA Architecture Prize has been awarded to Cris Ballester Parets representing a remarkable, collective research and production of bioregional social housing on the Balearic Islands undertaken between 2019-23," the jury stated. "The collective was necessarily wide-ranging, and cross-disciplinary. Ballester Parets worked particularly closely with architect Carles Oliver Barceló, residents, many leading architectural practices, economists, politicians, manufacturers, local suppliers and policy makers," it added.
"They developed an extraordinary model for building equitably, reestablishing local material supply chains and manufacturing, with fairer procurement and world-class climatically responsive architectural expression of social housing."

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Ballester Parets' housing developments were designed to...