The Future Architecture platform presents the first Creative Exchange and the third Matchmaking Conference, which will take place at the Museum of Architecture and Design (MAO) in Ljubljana from February 15 to 16, 2018. As the key exchange and networking event for European architecture, Creative Exchange will host a variety of architecture museums, festivals, producers, publishers, specialized agencies, academic institutions, and other cultural actors in architecture, who will use the platform to connect to emerging creatives, present their activities, and build joint projects.

"Our aim is to help shape more harmonious development of European society, its economy, and the living environment. The variety of critical situations that the EU is currently working its way through gives the platform further relevance as an open and transnational model with multiple identities under a common umbrella." – Matevž Čelik, platform leader and director of MAO

The first day of the event will be marked by Focus Talks, with talks by the program director of the Strelka Institute,Anastassia Smirnova, architect, theoretician, curator, and director Stephan Trüby, and Hanna Dencik Petersson, director of the Oslo Architecture Triennale, which will be joining Future Architecture as a member in 2019. A special guest, Croatian philosopher Srećko Horvat, will round off the day with the provocative talk “No Future = No Architecture!” The first Future Architecture Fair will provide a forum with cocktails for cultural operators and emerging creatives to meet and present their work.

The Matchmaking Conference in the second part of the event will showcase emerging talents selected at the Call for Ideas 2018 and connect them with 20 members of the platform to create the European Architecture Program 2018: Eutropian (Daniela Patti, Levente Polyak; Italy), Cartha (Elena Chiavi, Pablo Garrido i Arnaiz, Francisco Moura Veiga, Francisco Ramos, Rubén Valdez; Switzerland), Maksym Rokmaniko, Francesco Sebregondi, Enrico Zago, Melissa Frost (Netherlands), Julian Jauk (Austria), TAB collective (Philippe Jans, Therese Leick, Charles Rauchs, Wilhelm Scheruebl; Austria), Jason Hilgefort (Netherlands), Skrei (Francisco Fonseca, Pedro Jervell; Portugal), Martin Pohl with Konrad Angermüller, Mathias Schmitt, Michael Ott, Michael Kraus (Germany), Tania Tovar Torres (Mexico), RESOLVE (Akil Scafe-Smith, Gameli Ladzekpo, Seth Scafe-Smith, Vishnu Jayarajan; United Kingdom), Bartlebooth (Antonio Giráldez, Begoña Hermida, Pablo Ibáñez, Tarsila Sánchez; Spain), Eventually Made (Sebastian Bernardy, Vincent Meyer Madaus; Netherlands), Guillaume de Morsier, Valentin Kunik, Ibai Rigby (Switzerland), Miruna Dunu (Netherlands), Maite Borjabad (Spain), fala atelier (Portugal), Babau Bureau (Marco Ballarin, Elisa Brusegan, Stefano Tornieri, Massimo Triches; Italy), Architectural Thinking School for Children (Belarus), SET Architects (Lorenzo Catena, Onorato di Manno, Andrea Tanci; Italy), Phi (Calum Bowden, Cory Levinson, Aliaksandra Smirnova, Artem Stepanov, Aiwen Yin; Russia), Elena Agudo Sierra (Spain), and Piyush Prajapati (Dubai, UAE) as selected by the public in an online vote, as well as the winners of the Young Talent Architecture Award (YTAA) 2016, organised by the Mies van der Rohe Foundation: Tomasz Broma(Poland), Policarpo Baquera (Spain), and Iwo Borkowicz (Poland).

The Creative Exchange in Ljubljana will launch the European Architecture Program 2018—a series of interconnected activities that include three exhibitions, five conferences, four lecture series, a workshop, and a summer school, as well as prototyping and publishing activities, which will take place in twelve cities around Europe. The Future Architecture platform is co-funded by the European Union’s Creative Europe program.