Call for Entries: 2025 UNESCO Asia-Pacific Awards for Cultural Heritage Conservation

Celebrating 25 Years of Conservation Excellence within the Asia-Pacific Region

UNESCO is now accepting submissions for the 2025 Asia-Pacific Awards for Cultural Heritage Conservation, one of the crucial prestigious platforms recognizing excellent conservation efforts throughout the area. These awards not solely rejoice technical excellence and historic sensitivity but additionally promote the position of heritage in fostering sustainable improvement and strengthening group identification.

Launched in 2000, the UNESCO Heritage Awards have honored 305 initiatives in 27 international locations, starting from city landmarks to rural temples and industrial heritage websites. The awards function a catalyst for elevating heritage conservation requirements and demonstrating how cultural preservation can drive financial and social transformation.

What Are the UNESCO Heritage Awards?

The UNESCO Asia-Pacific Awards for Cultural Heritage Conservation had been created to acknowledge exemplary efforts by people, personal organizations, and public-private partnerships in restoring, conserving, or creatively reusing heritage properties. Each 12 months, the Awards acknowledge initiatives that reveal excellence in a number of key areas:

• Understanding of the heritage’s cultural and historic significance
• Technical achievements in conservation practices
• Sustainability and group engagement
• Catalytic influence at native, nationwide, or regional ranges

In 2025, as this system celebrates its twenty fifth anniversary, particular consideration might be given to conservation initiatives involving underrecognized or at-risk heritage typologies, comparable to:

• Vernacular structure
• Technological, industrial, and agricultural heritage
• Twentieth-century structure
• Cultural landscapes and routes

Selected initiatives in these classes might be showcased in a devoted anniversary exhibition later this 12 months.

Who Can Apply?

The Awards are open to personal sector actors, community-based organizations, and public-private partnerships throughout the Asia-Pacific area. Eligible initiatives embody:

• Residential, industrial, or institutional buildings
• Historic villages and cities
• Archaeological websites
• Sacred areas and cultural landscapes

To qualify, the conservation or adaptation challenge will need to have been accomplished inside the final ten years (after February 2015 for initiatives sustaining unique use, and after May 2024 for initiatives involving a change in use).

Award Categories

There are two main classes:

1. Conservation – Projects that contain restoring or conserving heritage buildings or websites.
2. New Design in Heritage Contexts – New architectural initiatives that combine harmoniously with historic settings, together with annexes, new buildings, bridges, and public areas.

Award Levels

Projects submitted to both class could also be acknowledged on the following ranges:

• Award of Excellence – The highest honor, given to a challenge that demonstrates distinctive high quality and far-reaching influence.
• Award of Distinction – For initiatives with excellent achievement and regional affect.
• Award of Merit – For commendable conservation efforts with clear, efficient outcomes.
• Award for New Design in Heritage Contexts – Recognizes exemplary up to date design inside historic environments.
• Special Recognition for Sustainable Development – Acknowledges initiatives contributing considerably to environmental and social sustainability.

How to Apply

To enter the competitors:

• Complete the official entry kind on-line.
• Prepare a challenge file that features:
  • An in depth challenge description within the required format
  • Architectural drawings and plans
  • High-resolution pictures of the challenge web site
• Submit the total application by mail to the UNESCO Regional Office in Bangkok, postmarked no later than 31 May 2025.

Winners might be introduced in November 2025.

Application supplies and submission pointers can be found here.

Spotlight on 2024 Awardees

In 2024, eight initiatives from 5 international locations obtained recognition, together with:

• Inari-yu Bathhouse Restoration, Japan – Award of Excellence
• Gunan Street Historic Block, China – Award of Distinction
• Abathsahayeshwarar Temple, India – Award of Distinction
• Rabindhorn Building, Thailand – Award for New Design in Heritage Contexts
• Additional awards went to initiatives in New Zealand and different areas of China and India.

These winners exemplify the variety, creativity, and group influence that the Awards purpose to advertise.

Why Apply?

Winning a UNESCO Asia-Pacific Heritage Award gives extra than simply recognition. It gives worldwide visibility, encourages funding and tourism alternatives, and positions the challenge as a mannequin for others. Conservation efforts which are rooted in sustainability and group values have the potential to encourage not solely professionals but additionally policymakers, educators, and the general public.

Contact and More Information

For challenge submissions and questions:

More particulars will be discovered here

For extra accessible alternatives, Click Here

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