World Monuments Fund and the furniture designer Knoll have announced the winner of their annual prize for the conservation of a historic Modernist building. The 2026 World Monuments Fund/Knoll Modernism Prize goes to the Australia-based architecture firm Architectus for its work on the historic Africa Hall building, which stands as one of the most important expressions of Modern architecture on the continent.
It is a building that brought together international ideas and local identity at a pivotal moment in the region’s history of decolonisation and national autonomy,” Barry Bergdoll, the prize’s jury chair and a professor at Columbia University (NYC), said in a statement. “From its placement at one of the most prominent sites in the capital of Ethiopia, the architecture combined a functionalist rationality of structure and purpose with the aura of Modernism’s optimism in the future.”
Africa Hall, the headquarters of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, was designed by the Italian architect Arturo Mezzedimi. Completed in 1961, it was commissioned by Emperor Haile Selassie. In 1963, the precursor to the African Union—the Organisation of African Unity—was founded inside. Africa Hall was constructed partially using local stone, and it incorporates a triptych of stained-glass windows by the artist Afewerk Tekle (1932-2012). (The contemporary artist Julie Mehretu took inspiration from these particular windows for her own monumental stained-glass project at the forthcoming Obama Presidential Center in Chicago.)
The award-winning conservation project on the building began in 2014 and took ten years and $57m to complete the renovation. Balancing the architect’s original vision with contemporary technology and accessibility requirements, Architectus worked with local experts on the building’s concrete structure and restoring
millions of tiles in its mosaics and hundreds of pieces of original Mezzedimi-designed furniture.
Source: https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2026/01/22/ethiopia-africa-hall-wins-modernist-conservation-award