Anna Puigjaner has been selected from nearly 200 applications as the winner of the Harvard University Graduate School of Design 2016 Wheelwright Prize. The $100,000 travel grant was awarded for her proposal, Kitchenless City: Architectural Systems for Social Welfare, for which she will study “exemplars of collective housing in Russia, Brazil, Sweden, China, Korea, and India, which reflect a variety of approaches to organizing and distributing domestic spaces.” Puigjaner notes that this typology is "deeply understood as a tool for social transformations," and through her investigation, she hopes to apply new thinking to the housing dilemmas of today. The prize will fund her travel and research over the next two years.
Puigjaner is a cofounder of MAIO Studio, which has executed several design projects, including furniture, interior spaces, and urban planning. The office will soon complete its first building project, a six floor residential complex in Barcelona. Puigjaner graduated from Escola Tècnica Superior d’Arquitectura de Barcelona-Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya with a BArch in 2004, MArch in 2008, and Ph.D. in 2014.
The 2016 Wheelwright Prize jury included Eva Franch, Jeannie Kim, Kiel Moe, Rafael Moneo, Ben Prosky, K. Michael Hays, and Mohsen Mostafavi.
