The "In Theory" category was introduced as a direct response to this year’s biennial theme, **“In Practice – as opposed to 'in theory',”** formulated by curators Andreas Kofler and Tudor Vlăsceanu as an investigation into contemporary architectural practice by highlighting the real processes that shape space and community. In 2026, Beta seeks to transform an existing building into a site of ongoing practice, bringing light to the negotiations, experiments, mistakes, solutions, and lessons that emerge throughout the working process.
If the overall theme of the biennial brings to the forefront the real, applied processes behind the built environment — the materials, constraints, decisions, and people that shape it — this new category aims to highlight the aspects that remain unseen: the experiments, the ideas that remain at the theoretical stage.
In the "In Theory" category, we are looking for works that, for various reasons, have remained unfinished or unsubmitted — ideas, concepts, and unseen projects that we wish to bring to light through this new category. To be eligible for this category, submitted projects must not have received awards at other professional events.
Category image: Beta 2026 venue square at an intermediate stage, photo credits: David Dumitrescu.
Jury
Useful information for registration
This category accepts projects that have been created or initiated by students or professionals in the field of Architecture, either individually or as a team, during the period 2016–2026.
Architecture, design, and public space projects that were created for the purpose of participating in other competitions may also be submitted, provided that they were not awarded in those competitions.
Works created within higher education institutions in the DKMT Euroregion, or works by authors with permanent residence in the DKMT Euroregion, may also be submitted.
Before starting the registration process for the Beta Awards, we recommend that you carefully read the rules and the application guide.
For registration for the Beta Awards, you will need to:
- fill in the registration form for the category you wish to participate in. Please prepare all the necessary information and materials for upload in advance. In the application guide, you will find all the required documents to help you prepare your materials ahead of time.
- prepare your exhibition panel according to the following layout — Layout_01. It will be uploaded in the registration form in JPEG, JPG, or PNG format, with a resolution between 150 and 300 dpi, and a maximum file size of 20 MB. For this category, your exhibition panel must contain: a site plan; optionally — if applicable, floor plans with legends, if applicable, photographs of the work, from events, of the project results. any other diagrams, analysis materials, or specific details necessary for understanding the project.
- prepare the images for the website. You will need to upload a minimum of 3 and a maximum of 10 representative images of the project. Each image must not exceed 1.5 MB.
After filling in the layout, please export it in .pdf format and upload it to the registration form.
DKMT
The DKMT Euroregion is a European cross-border cooperation region (DKMT referring to the territory between the Danube–Criș–Mureș–Tisa rivers) which currently includes the counties of Timiș, Caraș-Severin, Arad, and Hunedoara in Romania, the counties of Csongrád and Bács-Kiskun in Hungary, and the province of Vojvodina in Serbia.