Following the success of its first edition in 2025, EDGE Architecture Festival Budapest returns with a renewed urgency. The core questions remain — but today they cut deeper. What does it mean to build — and should we still build at all? And if so, how, with what tools, and for whom? How can architecture operate within planetary limits, and what forms of design can meaningfully respond to ecological and social collapse?
Artificial intelligence, once seen as disruptive, is now becoming infrastructure. Terms like post-digital, post-human have moved from theory to lived reality. In this context, EDGE Fest aims to explore the edge of architectural thinking: the political, ecological, technological and aesthetic dimensions of a profession in flux.
Across two days of talks, discussions, and other festival events, international and Hungarian voices — from renowned architects to emerging thinkers — will examine how architecture can respond to transformation. The festival also hosts the EDGE Awards, celebrating forward-looking, speculative, and built projects that challenge disciplinary norms and offer new directions for the future.
As a platform, EDGE Fest brings together diverse generations, cultural perspectives and regional narratives. It offers not just a program of lectures and awards, but a space for critical dialogue — where architecture is not treated as a closed system, but as an active agent in reshaping our world.
Budapest, situated at the crossroads of East and West, continues to serve as a unique vantage point for such exchange. In this city of contradictions and transitions, EDGE Fest offers an opportunity to rethink architecture's role — and to imagine what lies ahead.
The current EDGE Fest programme is expected to feature the participation of the following speakers and jury members (subject to change):
- Winy Maas (MVRDV, Netherlands) — Dutch architect and co-founder of MVRDV, known for experimental, research-driven architecture exploring density, sustainability and future urbanism.
- Michel Rojkind (Rojkind Arquitectos, Mexico) — Mexico City–based architect and founder of Rojkind Arquitectos, a representative of a Mexican generation of architects transforming the country.
- Rodia Valladares (Studio Gang, France) — Architect and design leader at Studio Gang, working on culturally and environmentally responsive projects across international contexts.
- Beat Huessler (Oppenheim Architecture, Switzerland) — Partner, Director Europe at Oppenheim Architecture, recognised for context-sensitive, climate-responsive design rooted in landscape and materiality.
- Alicia Lazzaroni (Animali Domestici, Italy // Aarhus Architecture School, Denmark) — Architect, researcher and curator engaging with contemporary architectural discourse and experimental practices.
- Antonio Bernacchi (Animali Domestici, Italy // Aarhus Architecture School, Denmark) — Architect and curator working at the intersection of architecture, publishing and cultural programming.
- Andrea Deplazes (ETH Zürich, Switzerland) — Architect, co-founder of Bearth & Deplazes and professor at ETH Zürich, known for his influential work on construction culture and architectural theory.
- Davide Tommaso Ferrando (Free University of Bozen-Bolzano / Faculty of Design and Art, Italy)— Architectural curator, critic and academic focusing on contemporary practice, media and spatial culture.
- Federica Sofia Zambeletti (KoorArch, Italy) — Founder of KoozArch, curator and editor exploring new narratives and formats for architectural communication.
- Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli (Royal College of Arts, UK) — Architect, curator and founder of 2050+, working across architecture, design, research and exhibition making.
- Job Floris (Monadnock, Netherlands) — Co-founder of Monadnock, known for rigorous urban housing projects and contemporary reinterpretations of European city form.
- Lara Lesmes (Space Popular, UK) — Architect and co-founder of Space Popular, investigating virtual environments, digital culture and architecture’s future narratives.
- Fredrik Hellberg (Space Popular, UK) — Architect, educator and co-founder of Space Popular, focusing on immersive environments and new spatial media.
- Owen Hopkins (Farrell Centre at Newcastle University, UK) — Architectural writer, curator and director of Farrell Centre at Newcastle University, contributing widely to discourse on architecture and the built environment.
- Regina Loukotova (ARCHIP, Prague) — Architect, educator and academic leader, rector of ARCHIP (Architectural Institute in Prague), active in international architectural education and research networks.
- Tekla Gedeon (Fuzzy Earth, Hungary) — Architect, co-founder of Fuzzy Earth creative studio blending art, architecture, gardening, and research to shape spaces, objects, and experiences that rethink how we live with nature.
- Sebastian Gschanes (Fuzzy Earth, Hungary) — Co-founder of Fuzzy Earth and architectural photographer known for his precise, atmospheric visual narratives of contemporary architecture and urban space.
- Edwin Heathcote (Financial Times, UK) — Architecture critic and author, widely known for his writing on contemporary architecture, cities and design culture.
Further speakers and jury members will be announced soon.
MORE INFO:
https://edgefest.hu/
EDGE AWARD APPLICATION:
https://edgefest.hu/en/awards
TICKETS:
https://cooltix.com/widget/event-products/699321e6d0fc1a3e618127d9?locale=en&primaryColorHex=A78460
Also check out other Festivals in Budapest, Arts events in Budapest, Literary Art events in Budapest.
