Architizer is thrilled to announce that the 2026 A+Product Awards is formally open for submissions! Get your merchandise in entrance of the AEC trade’s most famous designers by submitting at the moment.
The development trade has gotten fluent in carbon speak. Offset this, mitigate that, net-zero by each time. However fluency isn’t the identical as motion. Between now and 2050, upfront carbon — the emissions launched earlier than a constructing is even occupied — will account for half all the carbon footprint of latest development. As international constructing inventory doubles to accommodate practically 10 billion folks, these locked-in emissions threaten to devour a good portion of our remaining carbon finances. The maths is unforgiving. But for all of the spreadsheets and declarations, most sustainable design nonetheless operates on a single premise: Do much less hurt.
The issue isn’t the ambition. It’s the framing. Hurt discount suggests specifying responsibly means choosing the least-bad possibility from a catalog of compromises as if supplies exist in opposition to ecology. That logic was all the time backward. Supplies don’t oppose ecology — most of them are ecology (or, a minimum of, they may and needs to be). Bushes sequester carbon whereas rising. Sheep produce wool yearly, whether or not we use it or not. Clay returns to the bottom over centuries. The query was by no means whether or not supplies might assist regenerative techniques. It was whether or not the trade would use them for design at scale, whereas backing them with the sort of guarantee language that makes risk-averse procurement departments truly log out on the selection.
The barrier hasn’t been technical — 87% of development professionals cite the shortage of producer environmental product declarations as the first impediment to embodied carbon discount. Translation: designers needed to specify higher merchandise. They only wanted proof that these merchandise existed outdoors pilot packages and will survive worth engineering conferences.
Now, lastly, that proof has arrived. The next A+Product Awards winners reveal what occurs when efficiency necessities lastly catch as much as design prospects. Throughout lighting, glazing and envelope techniques, they every reveal how climate-positive specification can each look magnificent and carry out with proof to assist the formidable schemes of at the moment’s architects and inside designers.
Catifa Carta
By Arper
Jury Winner, Contract Furnishings, 2025 A+Product Awards
Image the Catifa 53 — the proportions, the shell type, the way in which it sits. Now remake it from compressed paper. That’s what Arper did utilizing PaperShell, a fabric know-how from Sweden that converts wooden manufacturing offcuts into structural craft paper. Twenty-nine sheets get pressed with steam and bio-resin into the chair’s type, locking in carbon the bushes captured whereas rising.
The paper floor has a refined texture and heat that reads in a different way than plastic or wooden veneer. It’s sturdy sufficient for contract use. And Arper has constructed the whole end-of-life pathway: they take the chair again, convert it via pyrolysis into biochar (which is as much as 90% carbon), then use that biochar to develop mycelium that rejuvenates soil. The entire cycle is closed earlier than the primary chair ships. Carbon-negative furnishings with precise infrastructure behind the declare.
Layered Duality
By Tarkett
Jury Winner, Carpet & Flooring, 2025 A+Product Awards
Tarkett took the polyvinyl butyral layer that bonds automobile windshields and architectural laminated glass — materials that’s troublesome to separate and recycle—and turned it into carpet tile backing. The gathering consists of 4 carpet patterns (Appeal to, Grounded Concord, Balancing Act, Balancing Accents) and two resilient flooring patterns with out PVC (Confluent Path, Open Path).
The ethos Modular backing is Cradle to Cradle Licensed Silver. What makes it work virtually: the Omnicoat Expertise layer creates a chemical barrier between the flooring and substrate, so moisture, pH fluctuations, or residual adhesives received’t trigger set up failures. The non-PVC resilient flooring checks identically to luxurious vinyl tile for dimensional stability and impression resistance, nevertheless it’s Crimson Listing Free for Dwelling Constructing Problem initiatives. When it’s completed, Tarkett takes it again via ReStart — and so they’ll settle for flooring from any producer, not simply their very own.
REGUPOL upscale
By Regupol
Widespread Selection Winner, Carpet & Flooring, 2025 A+Product Awards
That is what occurs while you take post-consumer tire rubber and post-industrial EPDM and switch them into planks and tiles that appear to be high-end terrazzo or honed concrete. REGUPOL upscale is available in twelve earth tones with refined mixture patterns. The floor is hotter to the touch than stone or ceramic. It has inherent cushioning that makes standing extra snug over lengthy intervals. It absorbs sound slightly than reflecting it. And since the colour and sample undergo the complete thickness, scratches and scuffs don’t present the way in which they might on a printed floor layer.
For healthcare services, academic areas, or anyplace folks stand for prolonged intervals, the ergonomic profit is measurable. For top-traffic business interiors, the dense patterning hides dust successfully. Each tonne of tire rubber diverted prevents methane emissions from landfill decomposition. It’s GreenCircle Licensed and contributes to LEED credit.
Kurtain
By Luxxbox
Jury Winner, Pendant Lighting, 2025 A+Product Awards
Luxxbox designed Kurtain to deal with a particular downside in open-plan places of work and collaborative areas: you want each activity lighting and acoustic management, however putting in separate techniques means coordinating two trades, two budgets, two upkeep schedules. Kurtain is a pendant with a high-performance LED core wrapped in a shade created from Camira Blazer wool felt.
The wool is renewable, absolutely compostable at end-of-life, and carries Indoor Benefit Gold and EU Ecolabel certifications. The big mannequin achieves an NRC of 0.70 — significant acoustic absorption — whereas delivering as much as 4,997 lumens in a direct-indirect configuration. CRI stays above 90, UGR under 19. The LED panel dims easily and provides non-obligatory Casambi Bluetooth management, power-over-ethernet, or tunable white. Accessible in three sizes and 77 colours with a 50,000-hour L70 rated lifetime. One fixture, one set up, two features.
Lia
By Focal Level
Widespread Selection Winner, Pendant Lighting, 2025 A+Product Awards
Focal Level’s Lia sequence (Lia, Lia Cloche, Lia Aspect) scales up the acoustic-plus-lighting idea for areas with critical ceiling peak. Image lobbies, atria, or double-height collaborative areas the place you want substantial gentle output and also you’re combating reverberation. The pendants are available in 3, 4, and 5-foot nominal diameters with 12 or 18-inch heights.
PET-felt fins (made with as much as 50% post-consumer recycled content material) wrap round high-performance LED engines that ship 2,000 to 17,000 lumens direct and 1,000 to five,000 lumens oblique, relying on dimension and configuration. The felt is Declare Licensed, Crimson Listing Free, and absolutely recyclable. 4 housing finishes and 24 felt colours, with dual-tone choices for Lia Aspect. The sculptural varieties have visible presence with out overwhelming the area, and so they’re doing significant acoustic and lighting work concurrently.
100% Recycled Textures
By 3form
Jury Winner, Better of the Yr, Sustainable Design, 2025 A+Product Awards
3form has been working with recycled content material of their translucent resin panels for over a decade, attaining 40% recycled content material via mechanical recycling. Their Know New Plastic initiative represents a technical shift: molecular recycling. As an alternative of grinding down plastic and re-melting it (which degrades the polymer chains every cycle), molecular recycling breaks plastics right down to their chemical constructing blocks and rebuilds them. The result’s materials that’s molecularly similar to virgin resin with no loss in optical readability or structural efficiency.
The 100% Recycled Textures assortment launched with 25 three-dimensional patterns—the deep-relief textures 3form is thought for, now made completely from recycled content material. Every 4×8 panel diverts the equal of three,296 plastic water bottles from landfill. Manufacturing with molecularly recycled materials reduces emissions by 25% in comparison with virgin resin. For initiatives the place translucency, coloration accuracy, or dimensional precision matter—healthcare, hospitality, high-end retail—these panels carry out identically to virgin materials whereas closing the loop on plastic waste.
Timber Curtain Wall (TCW)
By Unicel Architectural
Jury Winner, Glass & Glazing, 2025 A+Product Awards
Standard curtain partitions use aluminum or metal mullions with thermal breaks—bodily separations that interrupt the conductive path and cut back warmth loss. They’re obligatory as a result of metallic conducts warmth effectively. Unicel’s timber curtain wall approaches the issue in a different way: the mullions are created from engineered wooden, which is inherently insulating. Wooden’s thermal conductivity is roughly one-thousandth that of aluminum.
The system can accommodate load-bearing configurations with beneficiant glazing spans whereas sustaining thermal continuity. Unicel publishes efficiency information displaying as much as 72% larger power effectivity than typical aluminum curtain partitions via lowered conduction, convection, and radiation. For Passive Home initiatives or net-zero buildings, this essentially adjustments the envelope technique. The curtain wall stops being a thermal legal responsibility that requires mitigation and turns into a thermally performing meeting. The wooden is seen from the inside, bringing materials heat to what’s often a metallic element.
Guardian SunGuard SNX 70+
By Guardian Glass
Widespread Selection Winner, Glass & Glazing, 2025 A+Product Awards
Guardian’s SNX 70+ is a triple-silver coating utilized to their UltraClear low-iron glass. The efficiency numbers are particular: 68% seen gentle transmission with a 0.28 photo voltaic warmth achieve coefficient. That yields a light-to-solar achieve ratio of two.45—the very best in Guardian’s North American portfolio. It means you’re getting considerably extra daylight than warmth achieve.
Pair that with a 0.28 U-value for thermal insulation, exterior reflectance round 14% (low sufficient to keep away from glare points for neighbors or streetscapes), and a coloration rendering index of 95. Views keep color-accurate. The coating maintains impartial mirrored coloration from any viewing angle, so the constructing doesn’t shift from silver to blue relying on the place you’re standing. It’s designed for floor 2 of insulating glass items and works with numerous glass thicknesses and configurations. For curtain wall initiatives the place you’re maximizing daylight however want to regulate photo voltaic warmth achieve—particularly in blended climates—this coating makes the technique viable.
Zola Vanish – All Aluminum Pocketing Carry-Slide Doorways
By Zola Home windows
Jury Winner, Doorways & {Hardware}, 2025 A+Product Awards
Zola’s Vanish system accommodates as much as eight operable panels, every reaching 8 by 13 ft, that retract utterly into wall pockets. When open, you get a full-width aperture with no seen frames. The mechanism works on a lift-slide precept: flip the deal with, the panel lifts barely on elevated wheels and rolls horizontally with minimal effort, then settles again right down to compress multi-point seals towards the brink. The seals and weatherstripping create an hermetic closure when locked.
Accessible with normal thresholds or absolutely recessed zero-threshold particulars. The frames are thermally damaged insulated aluminum with low-iron triple-pane glazing. Profile sightlines keep slim—sometimes underneath 3 inches—so the visible emphasis is on the glass and the view, not the body. The system is engineered for repeated each day operation with out seal degradation. For residential initiatives the place indoor-outdoor connection issues, or hospitality areas that want to rework between enclosed and open configurations, this delivers the complete disappearing-wall expertise with thermal efficiency that works year-round.
Silver Metropolis Clean & Silver Metropolis Wirecut
By Glen-Gery
Jury Winner, Constructing Envelopes, Cladding, & Roofing, 2025 A+Product Awards
Glen-Gery’s Silver Metropolis brick is available in two floor remedies. Silver Metropolis Clean has a refined, nearly polished face with clear traces and a mushy silver-gray tone that reads as up to date—it pairs naturally with glass curtain partitions, blackened metal, or light-toned stone. Silver Metropolis Wirecut has a rougher, hand-crafted texture the place the wire reducing course of leaves seen drag marks and variation. It catches gentle in a different way all through the day and brings an industrial materiality to facades.
Each are fired clay brick, so that they ship the sturdiness and climate resistance you anticipate: no upkeep past occasional cleansing, dimensional stability, thermal mass, fireplace resistance. The colours are constant as a result of they’re fired, not surface-applied. Set up is simple with normal brick detailing. The environmental case for brick isn’t novel supplies—it’s longevity. A clay brick facade specified at the moment will simply final a century with minimal upkeep. If you’re calculating embodied carbon over a constructing’s precise lifespan slightly than simply development, that length issues considerably. Specify brick the place you need the fabric to outlast all the things round it.
Architizer is thrilled to announce that the 2026 A+Product Awards is formally open for submissions! Get your merchandise in entrance of the AEC trade’s most famous designers by submitting at the moment.
Deep reductions are supplied on entries till the Early Entry Deadline at Midnight PT on October thirty first. Don’t miss the possibility to your firm to affix the trade’s definitive celebration of product innovation — hit the blue button to entry the entry portal and get began:
Begin Submission →
