Tamayouz Excellence Award is proud to reveal the shortlist of finalists for the Rifat Chadirji Prize 2026, the award’s fifth cycle, themed The Right to Landscape: Reclaiming Land and Sustaining Lives in Sahl Al Khiam, Lebanon.
The 2026 Rifat Chadirji Prize was organised in collaboration with the International Federation of Landscape Architects (IFLA), and the IFLA Middle East Region, together with the Beirut Urban Lab at the American University of Beirut.
The shortlist has been selected from 68 submissions received from 26 countries by the Rifat Chadirji Prize jury, based on the criteria set in the competition’s brief. This year’s theme invited participants to envision a landscape-led approach to the recovery of Sahl Al Khiam, Lebanon, where land, livelihoods, ecology, and identity intersect.
The Prizes
The Rifat Chadirji Prize awards a total of $14,000 in cash prizes, three fully funded invitations for the Top 3 winners, and invitations for Honourable Mentions and shortlisted entries to attend the award ceremony. Winners receive a statuette, medals, certificates, and publication recognition.
The shortlistfor the Rifat Chadirji Prize 2026 is:
All finalists are arranged in countries’ alphabetical order
- University of Queensland – School of Architecture: Jonus Michael Darr from Brisbane, Australia
- Cairo Urban Studio: Salem Hussein, Argwan Wael, Haya Tarek, Mariam Ahmed Ezzat, Mirna Moutaz, Mohamed Magdy, Nada Mohamed, and Sara Tarek from Cairo, Egypt
- Olēa: Sofia Nikolaidou and Alexandra Kotti-Domprets from Athens, Greece
- AWR.Studio: Awar Naaman Saleem, Dr Ansam Bzour, and Kawdan Mohamamd Ali from Erbil, Iraq
- Curio Project: Retri Haryanto Atta, Sony Indrawan, Silmi Priliana, Widyasari Ayu Wibowo, Mahassen Masri, and Eugenia Natasha from Florence, Italy
- American University of Beirut – Team YMN: Noura Al Naamani, Yanane Yassine, and Maurice Mattar from Beirut, Lebanon
- Beirut Arab University – T 6: Nour Ibrahim, Nadia Abedal Sater, Farah Zantout, Sana Swaidane, Elissar Zeitouni, Mohamed al Kurdi, Nour Hamadi, and Sally Haidar from Beirut, Lebanon
- ITALABB: Carelle el Achkar, Claude el Haddad, Abdallah Dalloul, Simone Kehdeh, and Rani Vee from Beirut, Lebanon
- Paolo & Pablo: Pedro Pablo Garcia Alcazar and Paolo Damone from Barcelona, Spain
- Reem Traboulsi from Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- Green Alma: Nora Aridi, Viviane Viniarski, Gerardo Ponte, Will Sandy, and Zixu Qioa from London, the United Kingdom
- Landscape First: Niloufer Yusuf Shahapur from Manchester, the United Kingdom
- MNA26: Mohamad Nour Abo Amou from London, the United Kingdom
- The Collective: Jessica Huynh, Fatimah Ishmael, and Tereza Zivotska from London, the United Kingdom
- Out of Office Design: Ruoqi Jiang, Yibo Lin, Yaqiong Chen, Changshu Chen, and Shimin Zhou from San Francisco, the United States
- GreenLana: Svetlana Lozhkina from Tashkent, Uzbekistan
The Rifat Chadirji Prize, named after the prolific Iraqi architect Dr Rifat Chadirji, is an international thematic competition addressing architectural and urban challenges across the Near East and North Africa. Each cycle explores a different context: from Rebuilding Iraq’s Liberated Areas: Mosul’s Housing (2017), to the Baghdad Design Centre (2018), to Barjeel Museum for Modern Arab Art in Sharjah (2019), to A Living Pedestrian Bridge Over The Nile (2020).
Tamayouz Excellence Award is sponsored by 99 Properties Development, Coventry University, Dewan Architects + Engineers, the Mohamed Makiya Foundation, Bonair Ltd, Aji Group, and Round City Magazine.