Over the past twenty years, the Holcim Foundation Awards has committed USD 20M to spotlighting projects from an industry-changing cast of architects, designers, and engineers who champion innovative practices in sustainable design and construction.
To better tell these success stories, the Foundation launched a short film series called 'Words with Winners.' The series includes a conversation with Loreta Castro Reguera, co-founder of Taller Capital in Mexico City, about the design of the highly innovative La Quebradora Waterpark, which received a Holcim Foundation Award in 2018.
Water management is an increasingly urgent issue in Mexico City. Droughts and floods often plague the Mexican Capital, which largely lacks the infrastructure to effectively address either challenge. With this in mind, Loreta Castro Reguera, alongside Manuel Perló Cohen, director of the Institute for Social Research at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, set out to design La Quebradora Waterpark for the densely populated neighborhood of Iztapalapa.
The ingenuity of their resulting proposal propelled the project to win a Holcim Foundation Award in 2018. The award came at a critical time, as changes in local leadership threatened to halt the waterpark's construction.
'Winning the award helped us convince the people that had to decide between continuing its construction about the project's benefits. Having the credibility this prize gives to projects, we were able to make the government understand that they were making the correct decision,' says Castro Reguera.
The waterpark works by diverting rainwater from the Sierra de Santa Catarina mountain range, which typically floods Ermita Iztapalapa Avenue. Two roads serve as stormwater channels, guiding runoff to La Quebradora, where it passes a series of screens, filters into two permeable basins, and eventually infiltrates the underlying soil and groundwater.
Surrounding these basins are a series of sloping, tree-studded terraces and community buildings designed to encourage local engagement. This space features an open-air theater, a skate park, and various sporting facilities and plazas where residents can gather and socialize.
'During the project's design, we were going into many workshops to understand how we could help communities engage with it,' explains Castro Reguera.
In an underprivileged urban neighborhood like Iztapalapa, where open public spaces are scarce, projects like La Quebradora are particularly vital. The opening of the waterpark not only doubled the amount of public recreational space available to residents but also tripled the number of trees. "Instead of having a lawn that is always very expensive to maintain because it needs a lot of water, we decided to create a lot of hardscapes with trees," explains Castro Reguera.
Learn more about La Quebradora Waterpark project here and follow more series from Words with Winners.
One of the featured projects in the series is The Hikma Complex in Dandaji, Niger. It stands as a testament to the power of architecture in preserving cultural heritage while addressing contemporary needs. Designed by Mariam Issoufou of Mariam Issoufou Architects and Yasaman Esmaili of Studio Chahar, the project was a Holcim Foundation Award winner in 2018. Learn more about the project here.
THE HOLCIM FOUNDATION AWARDS 2025
The world's leading competition for sustainable design, Holcim Foundation Awards 2025, is calling for entries. The Swiss-based Holcim Foundation invites innovative projects at any scale, supported by clients and in the late-stage design phase, to compete for global recognition. The competition is free of charge with a prize pool of USD 1M and will be awarded across 20 winning entries.
Projects already under construction are eligible, provided construction is not completed before February 11, 2025. The entry window is now open from October 1, 2024 until February 11, 2025, with the Awards Ceremony at the Foundation's Venice Forum event on November 20, 2025.
Competition Entries Close: 11.02.2025
20 Winners Globally USD 1M Prize Pool
5 Special Recognition Prizes
Free to Enter