2027 DESIGN EXCELLENCE AWARDS
Great laboratory design deserves to be recognized
The Design Excellence Awards celebrate outstanding laboratory environments and the teams whose vision, collaboration, and expertise bring them to life.
From ambitious new research facilities to transformative renovations, sustainable environments, thoughtful interiors, and high-impact projects created within smaller budgets, the awards recognize projects advancing what’s possible in laboratory design.
SUBMISSIONS OPEN
October 12, 2026
SUBMISSION DEADLINE
December 4, 2026
PROJECT ELIGIBILITY
Completed + Occupied Jan. 1, 2025–Jan. 1, 2027
ENTRY FEE
$350 per project
ADDITIONAL CATEGORIES
+$100 for the same project
AWARD CATEGORIES
Four Categories
About the Design Excellence Awards
Celebrating the people and projects advancing laboratory design
The Design Excellence Awards recognize outstanding laboratory projects and the collaborative teams behind them.
The program celebrates everyone who contributes to the laboratory design process—from architects and lab planners to engineers, construction professionals, facility owners, lab end users, and the manufacturers and partners whose solutions help bring these environments to life.
Winning projects demonstrate more than an impressive finished space. They show how thoughtful planning, collaboration, innovation, and execution can create laboratory environments that better support the people, research, and communities they serve.
Why enter?
Put your team’s best work in the spotlight
A Design Excellence Award gives your project—and the people behind it—an opportunity to be recognized by the laboratory design community.
EARN INDUSTRY RECOGNITION
Celebrate the vision, expertise, and collaboration that brought your project to life.
SHOWCASE YOUR PROJECT
Highlight the design decisions, solutions, and features that make your laboratory a model for future projects.
SHARE WHAT YOU LEARNED
Show how your team addressed challenges, balanced competing priorities, and developed solutions others can learn from.
AMPLIFY YOUR WORK
Winning projects receive recognition through Lab Design News and the Lab Design Conference, extending the reach of your project within the laboratory design community.
CELEBRATE YOUR TEAM
Recognize the architects, engineers, planners, builders, owners, end users, manufacturers, and partners whose contributions made the finished environment possible.
2027 Award Categories
Where does your project stand out?
Projects may be submitted in one category or entered into a second category when the work demonstrates excellence across multiple areas.
Whole Building / Holistic Design
Excellence across the entire laboratory environment.
This category recognizes buildings designed to support an evolving scientific ecosystem while fostering collaboration, productivity, research, and occupant well-being.
Strong entries should demonstrate how user needs informed the facility as a whole and how laboratory spaces, workplace environments, building systems, amenities, and other design elements work together to create a safe, comfortable, and highly functional environment.
Projects should also demonstrate how the design creates a sense of connection and belonging for laboratory occupants and the surrounding community.
Sustainable Design
Laboratory environments that push performance forward.
This category recognizes projects demonstrating meaningful advances in energy savings, sustainable design, and green laboratory initiatives.
Strong entries should show how sustainable strategies have improved laboratory operations and created measurable benefits related to energy efficiency and cost. Consideration may include mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems as well as materials, casework, finishes, laboratory equipment, and other design decisions.
Interior Design
Interiors designed around the people and research they support.
This category recognizes projects where interior design meaningfully improves the laboratory research environment.
Strong entries should demonstrate how furnishings, casework, lighting, flooring, walls, ceilings, and other interior elements contribute to productive, comfortable, and accessible laboratory environments while supporting occupant well-being and the needs of a diverse workforce.
Small Project Design
Big ideas don’t require unlimited budgets.
This category recognizes laboratory projects with a total project cost under $20 million USD.
Strong entries should demonstrate how the project team maximized available resources to create a modern, effective research or innovation environment despite the realities of a smaller budget, footprint, or project team.
Entries should highlight creative solutions, effective use of available square footage, and how the team addressed challenges unique to smaller projects.
Is your project eligible?
Before you begin, make sure your project qualifies
Your project may be eligible for the 2027 Design Excellence Awards if:
- The facility was completed and occupied between January 1, 2025 and January 1, 2027
- The project is a laboratory facility, and may be located anywhere in the world
- The facility has not previously been submitted to the Design Excellence Awards
- The project meets any additional requirements for the category selected
For the Small Project Design category, the total project cost must be under $20 million USD.
A recently completed laboratory addition to a facility previously submitted to the awards may be eligible if the new addition falls within the current eligibility period. The submission must focus exclusively on the new addition and cannot repeat material from the previous entry.
Preparing your submission
Tell the story behind the finished space
A strong entry doesn’t just show what the laboratory looks like.
Help the judges understand why the project was needed, how your team approached it, what challenges you encountered, and what makes the finished environment exceptional.
Your complete project submission:
- Must be submitted in PDF format
- May not exceed 40 pages
- Should include clearly labeled, easy-to-read floor plans
- Should focus primarily on laboratory areas while using non-laboratory spaces where they help explain the overall project
- Should clearly address the criteria for every award category entered
Cover pages, image lists, and photographer release forms do not count toward the 40-page limit.
At the beginning of your submission, following the cover page, include:
- Full official facility name
- Complete facility address
- Groundbreaking date
- Official occupancy date
- Facility owner
- Facility size
- Overall project cost
- Cost per square foot or meter
- Submitting firm, company, or individual
- Primary contact information
- Full project team and contact information
- Award category or categories entered
- Project type: new build, renovation, or retrofit/adaptive reuse
Your submission should describe:
- How the project came about
- The facility’s mission and goals
- Why the project was necessary
- Challenges or obstacles encountered during design and construction
- How the project team addressed those challenges
- The overall design process
- The project timeline from conception through construction and occupancy
Where relevant, entries may also address:
- Sustainability and energy-saving initiatives
- Mechanical, HVAC, and engineering systems
- Safety and occupant comfort
- Flexibility and anticipated facility lifespan
- Community benefits
- How project costs and available resources were maximized
- Standards or regulations that differ from those used in the United States for international projects
High-resolution images should be:
- Embedded throughout your entry document
- Uploaded separately in one ZIP file
- Accompanied by captions and image credits
A numbered image list should be included at the end of the submission.
A signed release from the photographer(s) must also be included, confirming permission for submitted photography to be used in Design Excellence Awards judging, Lab Design News editorial coverage, and Lab Design Conference promotional materials.
Any images that are confidential and available for judging purposes only must be clearly identified as such.
How to enter
Put your best work forward in four steps
Choose your category.
Review the four award categories and determine where your project demonstrates its strongest achievements.
The same project can be entered in multiple categories for an additional fee; the initial entry fee only includes one category.Prepare your submission.
Gather your project information, project story, floor plans, photography, image permissions, and complete project team details.
If entering two+ categories, make sure your submission clearly demonstrates why the project merits consideration in each selected category.Submit your project.
Beginning October 12, 2026, complete the online entry process and upload the required submission materials.
Complete your entry by December 4.
Your complete submission and payment must be received by December 4, 2026.
The entry fee is $350 per project for one category. Each additional category you enter the same project into costs $100.
Key dates
Mark your calendar
JANUARY 1, 2025–JANUARY 1, 2027
Project Eligibility Window
Eligible facilities must have been completed and occupied during this period.
OCTOBER 12, 2026
Project Submissions Open
Begin your 2027 Design Excellence Awards entry.
DECEMBER 4, 2026
Submission Deadline
All entry materials and payment must be received by the deadline.
2027
Winners Announced
Winning projects will be recognized by Lab Design and celebrated in connection with the 2027 Lab Design Conference in Dallas.
Recognition that extends beyond the awards
Winning projects become part of a growing body of work recognized for excellence within the laboratory design community.
INDUSTRY RECOGNITION
Earn recognition as a Design Excellence Award-winning project.
LAB DESIGN EDITORIAL COVERAGE
Winning teams may be interviewed and featured through Lab Design editorial coverage.
WINNER BADGE
Receive a digital award badge for use on websites, social media, and promotional materials.
AWARD PLAQUE
Category winners receive a physical award plaque recognizing their achievement.
LAB DESIGN CONFERENCE RECOGNITION
Celebrate your achievement alongside the laboratory design community in connection with the 2027 Lab Design Conference in Dallas.
The awards have historically provided category winners with a plaque and digital badge, with Honorable Mention recipients receiving a digital badge and certificate.
Celebrate with us in Dallas
Where award-winning design meets the laboratory design community
The Design Excellence Awards and Lab Design Conference now share one home.
The conference brings together the architects, engineers, lab planners, facility professionals, construction professionals, lab end users, and industry partners shaping laboratory environments around the world.
The Design Excellence Awards give this community an opportunity to recognize exceptional work, celebrate the teams behind it, and discover projects that can inspire what comes next.
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
Submissions for the 2027 Design Excellence Awards open October 12, 2026.
Submissions for the 2027 Design Excellence Awards open October 12, 2026.
All entries must be completed, submitted, and paid in full by December 4, 2026.
Eligible projects must have been completed and occupied between January 1, 2025 and January 1, 2027.
Eligible laboratory projects may be located anywhere in the world.
The entry fee is $350 per project, which includes entry into one award category.
Yes. The same project may be entered into a second category for an additional $100, bringing the total entry fee for that project to $450.
Your submission should clearly demonstrate why the project merits consideration in each selected category.
Each project requires its own $350 entry fee.
For example:
Project A, one category: $350
Project B, one category: $350
Total: $700
If Project A is also entered into a second category, its fee would increase to $450.
Yes. You may submit multiple eligible projects. Each separate project requires its own submission and $350 entry fee.
Entries may not exceed 40 pages. The cover page, image list, and photographer release form do not count toward the 40-page maximum.
Your entry should be submitted as a PDF. High-resolution images must also be provided separately in a single ZIP file.
The four categories are:
- Whole Building / Holistic Design
- Sustainable Design
- Interior Design
- Small Project Design
Architects, building owners, lab planners, construction professionals, engineers, lab end users, equipment providers, manufacturers, and others involved in laboratory design and delivery are encouraged to enter.
Yes. Eligible laboratory projects from anywhere in the world may be submitted.
No. A facility previously entered into the Design Excellence Awards cannot be submitted again.
A recently completed laboratory addition to a previously entered facility may be eligible if it falls within the current eligibility period. In that case, the entry must focus solely on the new addition and cannot repeat material from the previous submission.
There is no general project size requirement.
However, the Small Project Design category is reserved for projects with a total project cost of under $20 million USD.
No. Individual feedback is not provided on submissions. Entrants are encouraged to review the guidelines carefully and contact the awards team with questions before submitting.
Only winning teams are notified.
Questions about the Design Excellence Awards or submission process can be sent to:
awards@labdesignconference.com