Winner of the 2008 Global Award for Sustainable Architecture is Carin Smuts, South Africa. The other nominees are Fabrizio Carola - Italy, Andrew Freear - USA, Alejandro Aravena - Chile and Philippe Samyn - Belgium.

With extremely small budgets, Carin Smuts builds amenities, housing, services, not only for but with the local communities. They work with her to establish the programme, and then build and manage it themselves. A Carin Smuts project generates more cultural energy than it uses materials. Just as the Bengali Muhammad Yunus invented micro-loans, Carin Smuts has invented sustainable microdevelopment, an approach that she sums up in a single phrase: “Do local: materials, details, labour.” Is the architecture she practises sustainable? She says it is, emphasising how: “a sense of economy, an intelligent use of materials, are the very ethics of architecture! But to build in the townships, people must first be able to express a need, formulate a programme, know how to put it into practice. Experience has taught me that this is impossible if people have not regained their own freedom. For me, architecture is simply the means for these people to regain charge of their own lives. Our work is about people.”

As the winner of the 2008 Global Award for Sustainable Architecture, Carin Smuts has been commissioned to build the second project in the Seine-Aval Architecture Manifesto-Collection: a multipurpose centre which will revitalise the small town of Follainville-Dennemont. The first project, a rural lodge in Chanteloup, has been commissioned from the 2007 winner Hermann Kaufmann and will open in spring 2009.

The prize was awarded by Pierre Bédier, Chairman of the Yvelines General Council, François de Mazières, Chairman of the Cité de l’architecture & du patrimoine and Jana Revedin, general coordinator of the operation. The "Global Award for Sustainable Architecture" will be run every year, leading to the construction of a house designed to environmental imperatives in each of the 51 communities of Seine-aval, which will eventually form the «manifesto collection of 21st-century architecture». This project falls within the National Interest Operation, a major development project initiated by the Government in this part of the north-west of the Yvelines area. The town of Chanteloup-les-Vignes was chosen to host the first Global Award. The winner will build an «urban lodge» measuring 300 m2 , designed to embody the values of sustainable development. The programme for this house, which will be open to the public, is to create a meeting room – for lectures, exhibitions and workshops – and an accommodation space for small groups or individuals; it is set for completion at the end of 2008. The construction budget for the house is €400,000. Hermann Kaufmann will immediately receive €25,000 as the winner of the award, and his fees for the design of the house will be €50,000. The whole Global Award for Sustainable Architecture operation is financed by Epamsa and the Yvelines Regional Council.

Initiated by the Cité de l’Architecture & du Patrimoine and Epamsa (Mantois Seine-aval public development establishment) with the backing of the Yvelines Regional Council, the objective of this prize is to contribute to the development of sustainable approaches to architecture. It involves a number of partners, including five of Europe’s biggest architecture centres, who form the scientific committee of the global award:

CIVA International Centre for the City, Architecture and Landscape, Brussels
DAM Deutsches Architektur Museum, Frankfurt
IABL International Architecture Biennale of Ljubljana
MFA Museum of Finnish Architecture, Helsinki
Università IUAV Venezia

Its aim is to explore the way in which a commitment to sustainable development modifies the creative process in architecture.