MVRDV senior associate Sanne van der Burgh has won the 2021 Innovation in Architecture Award from the Female Frontier Awards. In addition to the award given to Van der Burgh, MVRDV Partners Fokke Moerel and Wenchian Shi were also recognised in this year’s Female Frontier Awards, being selected as finalists in the Contribution to Architecture Award and the Unsung Hero Award, respectively.

Launched in 2020, the Female Frontier Awards recognise remarkable, talented, and visionary women at every level across global architecture. Given by World Architecture News, they champion innovation, encourage new and established talent, and celebrate the firms who are supporting women in their roles.

Sanne van der Burgh is a senior associate within MVRDV’s Studio EMEA, leading among other projects the design of Barapullah Springs – a proposal to rehabilitate an open sewer and the surrounding land in the centre of New Delhi, which she presented at last year’s World Urban Forum. Van der Burgh also heads MVRDV’s in-house tech team, MVRDV NEXT, which develops and implements computational workflows and new technologies within our office through a mixture of project-based work and standalone research.

In awarding her the Innovation in Architecture Award, the jury commended her “inspiring portfolio of diverse work custom-tailored to each project”, adding that “the MVRDV NEXT research and tech work Sanne is championing is extraordinary. Sanne is an Innovator but also a Young Star and a future Pioneer!”

MVRDV partner Fokke Moerel, who was a finalist in the Contribution to Architecture Award, is head of MVRDV’s Studio Public, leading projects with a focus on public and cultural works, transformations and interior design all around the globe.

MVRDV partner Wenchian Shi was a finalist in the Unsung Hero Award. She leads MVRDV’s Asia Studio, working on projects throughout East Asia and coordinating work between teams in MVRDV’s offices in Rotterdam and Shanghai.

See all the winners of the 2021 Female Frontier Awards here.