Two innovative, environmentally friendly designs claimed the city's top architectural awards this year, as the organiser vowed to wake up developers who put profit before the planet.
Polytechnic University's teaching hotel complex and the Ping Shan Tin Shui Wai leisure and cultural building were yesterday named as the two local recipients of medals from the Institute of Architects. A church in Huizhou, Guangdong, was the only recipient of the top prize outside the city.
The institute's president, Dominic Lam Kwong-ki, stressed the importance of green design and said the city lagged behind its regional neighbours in encouraging such buildings.
'For local developers, the electricity bills do not matter much,' Lam said. 'They raise rentals in the malls by a few points and can cover [the bills].'
The big developers had always been reluctant to accommodate the environmentally friendly features architects put to them, he said.
'The air conditioners are always on summer mode,' Lam said, as developers fear customers will desert malls where the temperatures are too warm.
Architect Rocco Yim, who designed the PolyU complex, had another worry: the city's landscape and the tendency of developers to build what he called 'wall-like towers' in the past few years.