Venice Architecture Biennale 2025: the ultimate guide

The time for the Venice Architecture Biennale 2025 launch in spring is almost upon us - and excitement has been ramping up in the architecture circles. This year's appointed curator, architect Carlo Ratti, and the team behind the world's largest architecture festival have been working non-stop towards the public opening on the 10th of May. As per past years, the main show's content specifics are largely under embargo, leading to much speculation in the architecture world as to its overall mood and narratives. However, a recent announcement has now revealed the list of participants in the main show and national participation groups, starting to paint a picture as to what to expect.

'The role of the biennale is to look at different challenges. Lesley's was a very important one,' said Ratti at the first global press conference around the event, acknowledging the 2023 Venice Architecture Biennale's influential theme by 2024 RIBA Gold Medal winner Lesley Lokko – and hinting at the future and the next steps in the grand exhibition's global explorations.

Venice Architecture Biennale 2025 overall theme: ‘Intelligens’

La Biennale di Venezia 2025 will focus on the topic of 'Intelligens: Natural. Artificial. Collective.' Ratti said of his theme: 'The title of the International Architecture Exhibition is usually announced both in English and in Italian. In 2025 it will be condensed into a single word for both languages via the common Latin precedent: intelligens. The title “Intelligens” is linked to the modern term “intelligence”, but it also evokes a wider set of associated meanings. In fact, the final syllable “gens” is Latin for “people”. A new, fictional root emerges, suggesting a future of intelligence that is inclusive, multiple, and imaginative beyond today’s limiting focus on AI.'

Exploring his topic through four sections, Ratti announced the sub-themes of Transdisciplinarity, Living Lab, Space For Ideas, and Circularity Protocol as key pillars in the way he conceived the main show. In an interview recently he revealed that the natural world, its wisdom and engineering are key influences in his work - and bridging natural and artificial is an important element that is missing in architecture today. 'People talk a lot about biomimicry, which is when you're copying nature, but here, it's more than copying nature per se. It is about copying the logic of nature,' he said.

Collaboration across disciplines and fields of human knowledge is also highly important and an area Ratti is keen to tap into in his show. He explained: 'I think we need to work more collaboratively. I always try to have teams of different disciplines working together. I call this approach the 'choral' architect.'

Venice Architecture Biennale 2025: main show

'We would like the biennale to be a dynamic lab,' said Ratti at a press conference in February outlining his key goals, themes and participants of the main show. Bringing together diverse teams and pairing seemingly disparate disciplines will help inspire unexpected and useful results, according to the Venice Architecture Biennale 2025 curator. 'Adaptation depends on inclusivity and collaboration and this is what I am experimenting with here,' he continued.

Case studies exhibited and project teams span the globe - even reaching one examining outer space. Climate change and sustainable architecture action will feature prominently in the various narrative threads. AI also makes an appearance, as part of the main show is a dialogue between creatives and artificial intelligence.

Circularity and openness

Last year, Ratti also launched a circular economy manifesto for this Venice Architecture Biennale - inviting participants to tackle core challenges in exhibition design, in order to produce a truly circular festival. This goal is outlined in the manifesto, which was developed with guidance from Arup and input from the Ellen MacArthur Foundation. The team wrote at the time: 'Our goal is to demonstrate that architecture and the built environment can coexist harmoniously with our planet, by eliminating waste, circulating materials and regenerating natural systems. We commit to creating pavilions and spaces that are not just temporary showcases but offer examples of bold circular thinking and create lasting legacies.'

With all this in mind, the curator put an open call for proposals, for the first time ever in the festival's long history, 'no matter how audacious,' from both architects and non-architects. In fact, trans-disciplinarity seems to be the name of the game, with Ratti inviting the global community of practitioners, scientists, scholars, activists, and others to help him create a diverse, creative biennale. 'It was both thrilling and daunting. We got flooded with thousands of emails but at the same time, we were able to find voices in parts of the planet who we would have never discovered without this open call,' Ratti says.

Main show participants: Arsenale and beyond

The Venice Architecture Biennale 2025 will showcase contributions from over 750 participants: architects and engineers, mathematicians and climate scientists, philosophers and artists, chefs and coders, writers and woodcarvers, farmers and fashion designers, and many more.

The exhibitors include names such as Lina Ghotmeh Architecture, Liam Young, Tosin Oshinowo, Bjarke Ingels Group, Winy Maas, Aaron Betsky, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, MAD Architects, Philip Youan, Boonserm Premthada, Olalekan Jeyifous, Matteo Thun & Partners, Alejandro Aravena, EcoLogicStudio, Counterspace/Sumayya Vally, Studio Zhu Pei, Marina Tabassum Architects, 3XN, Architectural Association/Ingrid Schroeder, 3XN, Material Cultures, Studio Gang, Transsolar, Patricia Urquiola, and Mass Design Group.

As the Central Pavilion at Giardini, which traditionally hosts part of the curator's show, is currently closed and under refurbishment, part of the main exhibition will be spread across Venice, occupying different sites and engaging creatively with the entire city. 'With the venue of the Central Pavilion under renovation in 2025, Venice will not just host the Biennale Architettura—it will become a living laboratory. The city itself – one of the most imperilled on Earth in the face of a changing climate—will serve as the backdrop for a new kind of Exhibition, where installations, prototypes, and experiments are scattered across the Giardini, the Arsenale and other neighbourhoods,' Ratti explains.

Special Projects at the Biennale

Two main special projects will accompany the main show and national participations. One is titled Margherissima and will be exhibited inside the Austrian armoury (Polveriera austriaca), Forte Marghera in Mestre. It is a scheme focusing on its wider area and contributors include Nigel Coates, Michael Kevern, Guan Lee, John Maybury and Jan Bunge.

The second is the Biennale's ninth collaboration with the Victoria and Albert Museum in London on the Applied Arts Pavilion Special Project. This will this year be titled On Storage. Curated by Brendan Cormier in collaboration with Diller, Scofidio + Renfro (DS+R), it will explore the global architecture of storage.

Venice Architecture Biennale 2025: National Participations

Situated at their namesake pavilion across the Giardini park, as well as selected sites across Venice, the national participations for the Venice Architecture Biennale 2025 is as rich and far-reaching as ever. Brand new exhibitors include the Republic of Azerbaijan, the Sultanate of Oman, Qatar, and Togo. Watch this space as our National Pavilions coverage unfolds in the next few days.

The basics: places, dates and tickets

The Venice Architecture Biennale 2025 will be open to the public between 10 May and 23 November 2025, including two vernissage days on the 8 and 9 May. The shows will be, as always, split between Venice's famed Arsenale and Giardini locations, with the former focused on Ratti's main showcase and the latter containing the always-rich and layered national participations in their respective, dedicated pavilions. Tickets for the main sites are available at the entrance and opening hours are 11 am - 7 pm (last admission 6:45 pm), with the venue closed on Mondays (except 12 May and 17 November).

As always more events are spread across Venice - including both independent programmes and collateral events, and national participations who may not be accommodated in the Giardini site.

The Biennale College Architettura, which launched in 2023, is also returning in 2025 for its second iteration as part of the festival's education arm. Ratti has invited students, graduate students and emerging practitioners under the age of 30 to take part and 'submit projects that employ natural, artificial, and collective intelligence to combat the climate crisis'.

The 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale will run 10 May till 23 November 2025

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