The World Architecture Festival is the world's largest, live, global architectural awards programme. Sto was pleased to sponsor the Arcaid architectural photography competition, judged as part of the World Architecture Festival, held in Singapore from 4 - 6 November. The winner has been crowned World Architectural Photographer of the year 2015.

The Arcaid Images Architectural Photography Award aims to put the focus onto the skill and creativity of the photographer. We ask the judges and the viewers to look beyond the architecture to the composition, light, scale, atmosphere, sense of place and understanding of the project. Of the 770 original entrants a pre-selection and reduction to just 20 images was made by the eminent judges:

Fabrizio Barozzi and Alberto Veiga, Architects (Barcelona);
Amy Croft, Curator, Sto Werkstatt (London);
Katy Harris, Head of Communications, Foster + Partners (London);
Ian Moore, Architect (Sydney);
Clifford Pearson, Deputy Editor, Architectural Record (New York);
Christine Murray, Editor, Architectural Review (London)
and last year's winners Nick Hufton and Allan Crow, Photography (London).

All were given the difficult task to look beyond the architecture itself and to consider the photograph's merit in terms of composition, sense of place, atmosphere and use of scale. The final selection was made by the attendees with a vote per category. These categories were:

- Exterior.
- Sense of Space.
- Interior.
- Buildings in Use.

We are very pleased to announce the following:

Winner of the Category: Exteriors

Photographer: Su Shengliang
Building: Long Museum West Bund
Place and Country: Shanghai - China
Architect: Atelier Deshaus, China

Winner of the Category: Sense of Place

Photographer: Tom Roe
Building: Kandalama Hotel
Place and Country: Dambulla - Sri Lanka
Architect: Geoffrey Bawa, Sri Lanka

Winner of the Category: Interiors

Photographer: Su Shengliang
Building: Long Museum West Bund
Place and Country: Shanghai - China
Architect: Atelier Deshaus, China

Winner of the Category: Buildings in Use

Photographer: Tan Lingfei
Building: Yick Cheong Building
Place and Country: Quarry Bay - Hong Kong

The overall winner;
2015 Arcaid Architectural Photographer of the Year prize
goes to the Portuguese photographer

Fernando Guerra

for his image in the category Buildings in Use of EPFL Quartier Nord by Richter Dahl Rocha & Associ's in Ecublens, Switzerland.

As part of the voting process and as a small token of gratitude two lucky winners will receive a copy of 'Castelvecchio', a book by Arcaid Images founder photographer, Richard Bryant. The winners will be notified as soon as the book is published in spring 2016.

The shortlisted entries alongside the winning image will feature in an exhibition 'Building Images' at Sto Werkstatt, London from February 5th - 25th March 2016. The Werkstatt is known as an important East London cultural hub for architectural and design discourse, presenting a programme of exhibitions, CPD's workshops and consultations for the architectural facade and acoustics experts.

You are more than welcome to visit.

Werkstatt.sto.com | The Werkstatt film is available to view online.