DAI Grand Prize for Building Culture awarded to urban planner Christa Reicher
The professor of urban planning and design at the Faculty of Architecture has received the Grand Prize for Building Culture from the Association of German Architects and Engineers for her many years of commitment to architecture and urban development.
The award ceremony took place at a ceremony on 01 October 2022 above the rooftops of Münster. After a ceremonial speech by Prof. Dr. Messner, the President of the Federal Environmental Agency, and the laudatory speech by Prof. Dr.-Ing. Iris Reuther, the Senate Building Director of the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen, Arnold Ernst, the President of the DAI presented the bronze cube by the Berlin artist Emanuel Scharfenberg to the award winner.
Christa Reicher studied architecture at RWTH Aachen University and ETH Zurich, and returned to RWTH Aachen University for the winter semester 2018/19. She holds the Chair of Urban Planning and Design and heads the Institute of Urban Planning and European Urban Studies. In the laudation, the following reasons for the special award were highlighted: her understanding as a "university teacher with heart and soul", her role as a thought leader for integration and interdisciplinarity, the appreciation and international recognition as an "excellent urban researcher and publicist" and, last but not least, perception of her person in the professional public as a protagonist for building and planning culture. She and her team have been successful in numerous international planning competitions - in the international competition for the Melaten Campus, in the Urban Tech Republic for Tegel Airport in Berlin, and recently in the urban planning procedure for the more than 150-hectare site of the former Schönefeld-Nord Airport.
The DAI Grand Prize for Building Culture is awarded every two years, alternating with the DAI Literature Prize, for special services to building culture in Germany. It honors the recipient:in for their life's work and is the most significant honor of its kind.