STUDIO
SNØHETTA
Beijing Library, China. 2023
Studio Details
Location
Venice, Italy
Date
29 June-10 July, 2026
Team Leaders
Jette Cathrin Hopp (Director, Snøhetta)
Mayur Mehta (Senior Landscape Architect, Snøhetta)
Angelo Pezzotta (Senior Interior Architect, Snøhetta)
Program
Lagoonal Architecture
Field Trips and Site Visits
A kayaking tour in the Venetian lagoon
A site visit to the islands of the lagoon
Studio Details
Location
Tokyo, Japan
Date
13 July-24 July, 2026
Team Leaders
Gumji Kang (Managing Director Australasia, Snøhetta)
Sam Cannon (Landscape Architect, Snøhetta)
Program
Urban and Public Realm Regeneration
Field Trips and Site Visits
COMING SOON
Venice Project
How can architecture and landscape design create public spaces of collective wonder? Can human intervention work with the natural environment and not against it? Which typology might arise when we abandon an anthropocentric view on design?
We will engage critically with these questions in relation to the lagoon of Venice and explore its unique ecosystem. The lagoon is characterized, beyond Venice, by several Islands of different dimensions and origins. This unique territory flooded by water with fluctuating salinity level and seasonal temperature variations has fostered the development of a complex ecosystem.
The object of our exploration will be architectural interventions that intersect and engage the lagoon in radical and generative ways, grounded in both conceptual and phenomenological frameworks. In our practice we give great emphasis on understanding the habitat of a place, which includes all its living creatures in biotic and abiotic relationships. Each project understands its specific site to best support the natural habitats that are positive for its location. Soils, vegetation, flora and fauna are all important in developing our work.
We will develop Iconic gestures that interrogate conventional notions of scale and perception while minimizing, or ideally regenerating, their physical impact on the natural environment.
At the heart of Snøhetta’s working method is an integrated approach, stemming from a core belief that creating platforms for people with different perspectives and competencies to interact is a catalyst for innovation. We call this transpositioning and, at Venice Studio, you will have the chance to experience this methodology of work. The program and typological exploration of each project will be a key part of the collective discussions in the studio and ultimately inform the formal process.
This will encompass everything from testing abstract ideas to putting things together that haven’t been put together before, testing the physicality of an element, its weight, its memory, its smell, everything the context might offer, and referencing this back to the design process.
Tokyo Project
Can architecture restore life to what is not yet dead? How can the process of design act to regenerate the spirit of a place – an ephemeral essence built upon social interactions, material memory and deep cultural narrative without overriding (over-writing) the very thing that gives it identity?
We invite our teams to critically engage with questions of regeneration and reimagination in relation to the Shotengai of Tokyo – culturally rich market laneways which have served as socio-spatial spines for local communities across generations.
As collectively governed, perpetually dynamic living structures, Shotengai hold a unique mirror to the social tapestry of individual neighbourhoods. We will be moving through this fabric together – listening, observing, collecting – the stories of the Shotengai, both tangible and intangible.
Through a process that involves site walking, and deep-observation, we will develop subjective understandings of what makes a place “alive,” to imagine interventions that are considerate of context, modest in scale and radical in attentiveness.
We are not necessarily interested in redesigning or preserving the general typology of the market laneway. Rather, our ambition is to build a deep understanding of their essences and what makes them culturally valuable, to imagine an array of possible futures.
In our studio, participants will have the opportunity to experience Snøhetta’s unique design methodologies and trans-disciplinary process, which stem from the core belief that all successful projects are the outcome of diverse collections of perspectives and experiences – each as important as the next.
Venice Partner
TBA21–Academy
TBA21–Academy is TBA21 Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary’s research center fostering a deeper relationship with the Ocean and other bodies of water through the lens of art to inspire care and action. Established in 2011, the Academy has since worked as an incubator for collaborative inquiry, artistic production, and environmental advocacy, catalyzing new forms of knowledge emerging from the exchanges between art, science, policy, and conservation. In 2019, TBA21–Academy opened Ocean Space in Venice, a planetary center that hosts exhibitions and public activities that accelerate critical ocean literacy through the arts. Building on TBA21–Academy’s expansive work, this embassy for the Ocean fosters wonder, engagement and collective action on the most pressing issues facing the Ocean today.
Snøhetta (Norwegian pronunciation: [ˈsnøːˌhɛtɑ]) began as a collaborative architectural and landscape workshop, and has remained true to its trans-disciplinary way of thinking since its inception. Our work strives to enhance our sense of surroundings, identity and relationship to others and the physical spaces we inhabit, whether feral or human-made. Museums, products, reindeer observatories, graphics, landscapes and dollhouses get the same care and attention to purpose. Today, Snøhetta has grown to become an internationally renowned practice of architecture, landscape architecture, interior architecture, product, graphic, digital design and art, with 280 employees of more than thirty different nationalities, and an equal gender distribution. Snøhetta is a place nobody is from, but anyone can go to.
Internships & Opportunities
Young designers and students accepted to join Snøhetta at Venice Studio may be considered for available internship or job opportunities at Snøhetta. Selection of candidates is at the sole discretion of the team leaders and Snøhetta. Places are not guaranteed.