Venice 25

Location
Venice, Italy

Year
2025

Program
Spaces of Contemplation and Production

Team Leaders
Jette Cathrin Hopp (Director, Snøhetta)
Tommaso Maserati (Architect, Snøhetta)
Angelo Pezzotta (Senior Interior Architect, Snøhetta)

Team
Haier Yang (Pratt Institute, USA)
Yue (Luna) Wang (University of Melbourne, Australia)
Georgia Mentzines (University of Melbourne, Australia)
Sandrine Awwad (Northeasern University, USA)
Mirai Tanabe (University of Melbourne, Australia)
Yuyao Che (University of Melbourne, Australia)
Francisco Toro (University of Desarrollo, Chile)
Andy An (University of Melbourne, Australia)
Christopher Arena (University of Melbourne, Australia)
Fiona Hu (University of Melbourne, Australia)
Hao-Jhe Huang (Royal College of Art, UK)
Chia Yu Tung (Royal College of Art, UK)
Ashley Concannon (Academy of Art University, USA)
Allie McAndrews (University of Nebraska Lincoln, USA)
Beni Lawson (Yale University, USA)
Omar AlAhmadani (Ajman University, UAE)

Project
The Productive Garden – Hortus Conclusus II
The Venetian lagoon is a complex ecosystem supporting diverse plant and animal life, from marine algae and halophytes to flamingos, herons, and fish communities. Despite its ecological importance, with Barene absorbing 85 tons of CO2 per square kilometer annually, the archipelago has been heavily altered by human use over centuries. Islands have served defensive, medical, and religious purposes, with structures like forts, hospitals, and monasteries imposed upon the landscape without meaningful interaction with the lagoon’s natural systems.

Today, many of these islands and abandoned structures are being converted into exclusive tourist resorts that treat the lagoon merely as scenic backdrop rather than engaging with it as a living ecosystem. We propose an alternative approach: creating spaces of contemplation that function as instruments for experiencing and understanding the lagoon’s natural phenomena. These minimal interventions could, for example, frame views, amplify natural sounds, reveal tidal patterns and wildlife movements, and explore non-anthropocentric design that gives agency to other species. The goal is to shift from a paradigm of consumption to one of conservation through phenomenological awareness and deeper ecological engagement.

Beyond conservation, we are also interested in exploring spaces of production (as a continuation of the main theme conducted by Snøhetta during these years at Venice Studio) and the creating of spaces that actively enhance ecological wealth through symbiotic relationships with natural processes. Rather than depleting (Consumption) or preserving (Conservation), these structures could generate ecological wealth through the potential integration of scientific research, workshops, sustainable resource cultivation and other unexplored forms of production. Such programs might include innovative aquaculture installations that restore marine populations, cultivation facilities to strengthen plant communities, laboratories studying climate adaptation strategies, or entirely new functional typologies that transform our understanding of how architecture can participate in environmental systems while demonstrating how active human presence might contribute positively to ecological processes rather than merely consuming/conserving them.