Organised since 2021, the Experiments’ Platform is a mentorship, alternative education, and idea development programme. Acting as a creative incubator, the platform annually invites participants to explore and discover alternative architectural practices.

This year, participants of the Experiments’ Platform will be guided by experienced mentors from Lithuania and abroad, take part in a residency at VARES in Estonia, and have the opportunity to present their experiments in a group exhibition in Vilnius.

Students and young professionals in architecture, interior design, landscape architecture, urbanism, and related fields are invited to submit ideas for experiments that analyse socially, ecologically, and economically inclusive environments.

Season Six Theme: Affording Environments

Curated by architects and researchers Aistė Gaidilionytė and Kamilė Vasiliauskaitė, the sixth season of the platform invites a focus on Affording Environments. These are understood here as an entirety of material and immaterial factors that create a certain medium for interaction.

As manifestations of the Smooth City (as described in the book by researcher René Boer) are ever more persistent through artificial, profit-generating and sterile spaces that do not allow diversity and create exclusion, the Experiments’ Platform invites spatial practitioners to look for methods in building resilience and learning from environments that do not succumb to smoothing.

The platform will encourage moving beyond what human-made environments provide formally or functionally, considering instead how they include and empower different social groups, bodies, and species, whilst inviting empathy, dialogue, and interaction between humans and more than humans.

The sixth season of the platform is an invitation to critically reflect on the phenomenon of smoothing and homogenising spaces and consider how human-made environments can foster inclusivity, empathy, and resistance to productivity and control.

Mentorship

Throughout the programme, participants will be guided and consulted by an international team of creators developing alternative architectural practices: artist and spatial practitioner Aušra Česnauskytė (Netherlands / Lithuania), architect and spatial artist Ulla Alla (Estonia / Georgia), landscape architect Ella Prokkola (Finland), and architect and independent researcher Pablo Encinas Alonso (Sweden / Spain).

Supported by these mentors and the project’s team, participants will acquire the necessary tools to develop their ideas and expand their knowledge regarding the possibilities of cultivating alternative spatial practices.

VARES Residency

The sixth season of the Experiments’ Platform will be implemented in partnership with VARES, an international and interdisciplinary residency based in Valga, Estonia, whose aim is to seek, find and create alternative spatial practices. Particular focus here is placed on the critical rethinking of the architectural discipline, the pursuit of slow practices, the revival of vernacular and traditional crafts, and the repurposing of used materials. It’s a space for lifelong learning for architects and spatial artists.

In July, the selected participants will travel for a five-day residency in this unique space. This time will be dedicated to meeting the team, delving into the programme’s theme, generating ideas, and taking the first steps in developing their experiments alongside the mentors.

Programme Timeline

The platform’s programme will run from June to November this year. In July, participants will spend five days developing their projects at the residency in Valga, co-organised by Architektūros fondas and VARES, which will host mentorship sessions, workshops, and collective reflections on the experiments. Throughout the programme, participants will have individual consultations with their mentors. At the end of the mentorship cycle in November, the implemented experiments will be presented in Vilnius at a group exhibition held at the SODAS 2123 cultural centre.

The Experiments’ Platform offers participants:

• a budget of up to €300 for the research and production of the experiment;
• 5 individual mentorship consultations;
• a five-day residency (6–10 July this year) at VARES in Valga, Estonia (travel and accommodation expenses are covered);
• the opportunity to present their implemented experiment at a group exhibition in the SODAS 2123 cultural centre in Vilnius;
• technical and curatorial support from the Experiments’ Platform team.

What we expect from participants:

• conscious, responsible, and sensitive involvement in the project’s activities throughout the 2026 programme (June–November);
• the ability to independently create and develop their project, as well as present its results;
• fluent communication in English;
• availability to attend the VARES residency (6–10 July this year) and the platform’s results presentation event in Vilnius (November).

Application Requirements

We welcome applications from emerging spatial practitioners operating in Lithuania. Submissions must include:

• proposed experiment idea, presented in a textual, visual, or other format (in English);
• a motivation letter explaining why you wish to join the 2026 Experiments’ Platform programme (up to 300 words, in English);
• a CV and a portfolio of your work (in English).

Please send all documents (the idea presentation, CV, portfolio, and motivation letter) in PDF format to exp@archfondas.lt.

Application deadline: 8 June.