The Taipei Tennis Center, designed by architect Chien Hsueh-yi (簡學義), was on Monday last week announced as the winner of this year’s Taiwan Architecture Award by Taiwan Architect magazine.
The selection and handling of details, color scheme and construction materials reflect the designer’s intentionality, the panel of judges said, adding that the center’s natural ventilation and air flow were also well thought out.
They praised the center for not only meeting the high standards of international tennis, but also being tightly integrated into the lives of local residents.
An open space on the roof provides a view of the city, a contrast with the claustrophobic feeling that traditional sports centers give, they said.
The center was the focus of news reports this summer after athletes competing in the Taipei Summer Universiade were worn down by extreme heat, as the facility’s design was modified from a roofed structure to an open court due to construction budget cuts during the administration of former Taipei mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌).
Two projects in Yilan County received honorable mentions: Jhong Shan School Hall, a sports complex designed by architect Huang Sheng-yuan (黃聲遠) inside Jhong Shan Elementary School, and the new administration building of the Sansing Township (三星) Office designed by architecture firm Harmonious Architects & Planners.
National Taichung Theater, designed by Japanese architect Toyo Ito, received a special prize due to the incomparable scale and challenge of the project, the magazine said, adding that it broke several international team effort records.
The magazine, published by the National Association of Architects, selected the winner from 12 nominated works.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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