Accepting applications has already been completed - not only the winners of past years, critics and experts who were interviewed by the executive director of the award Marta Thorn, could offer their nominees, but also any licensed architect. Predicting the choice of an international jury is almost impossible. We have no doubt - he will surprise this year too. And we remember that the main contenders for the bronze medal and $ 100,000 over the last year made a notable one.

Bjarke Ingels - one of the main experimenters and inventors of new formats built the summer pavilion of the Serpentine Gallery 2016, and his bureau BIG completed the construction of the residential complex VIA 57 West in Manhattan. But for the main prize, awarded mainly for a general contribution to art, the Dane is still too young.

Bjarke Ingels.

Daniel Libeskind has long been listed in the contenders for the "Nobel" Prize in Architecture. The leading expert on the painful moments of historical memory and large-scale town-planning plans this year was not very noticeable, although he leads several large projects at once and continues to win competitions all over the world. But its tough, hurting architecture is definitely an appraisal phenomenon.

Daniel Libeskind.

American Stephen Hall it is also not the first time that it is among the main contenders for the main architectural award and deserves it. Last year, his bureau completed work on the Fine Arts Building at the University of Iowa, and this should be completed by the Maggie Cancer Center at St. Bartholomew Hospital in London.

Stephen Hall.

Kengo Kuma. In addition to not very loud buildings in his corporate style, a connoisseur of untreated wood and natural materials in general, a lover of screens and vertical articulations became involved in a scandalous story about the project of the Olympic stadium in Tokyo and participated in the competition for the Anderson Museum in Odense. Pritzker Prize traditionally appreciates the Japanese architectural school of the jury, and Cooma is one of the few stars from the Land of the Rising Sun that has not yet been awarded.

Kengo Kuma.

Santiago Calatrava - Another one of the veterans among the applicants and one of the most expected nominees. Recently I was forced to talk about myself after the opening of the controversial and expensive transport terminal of the World Trade Center in New York, as well as the publication of the project of the UAE pavilion for EXPO-2020 and the Peninsula Place project for London. Deciding to support the uneasy reputation of the Spaniard and his too independent course, which he is working beyond any tendencies and traditions, will not be easy.

Santiago Calatrava.

Francina Huben (Francine Houben). Irish women Shelley MacNamara and Yvonne Farrell are invited by the curators of the 2018 Venice Biennale of Architecture, from which they are expected to discuss the development of educational and public spaces in the modern world. In this context, the choice of one of the founders of Mecanoo and its creative director, who is considered to be an expert in this field, would look quite logical. In 2016, the bureau completed the construction of two colleges and a student dormitory in Leiden, received approval for its project for the University of Manchester and showed a draft renovation project for the New York Public Library.

Francina Huben.

David Chipperfieldwho started his career in the workshops of two Pritzker winners, Norman Foster and Richard Rogers, who has been a jury member since 2015, is also considered a traditional nominee. A specialist in the reconstruction of historic buildings (among his current projects is the construction of Héro Saarinen in London, from which the US Embassy departs, and the New National Gallery of Mies van der Rohe in Berlin) and the architectural context built the flagship boutique Valentino on London’s Bond Street and won the competition for the reconstruction of the administrative buildings on boulevard Morlan in Paris.

David Chipperfield.