The British Council has announced the team selected to represent the UK at the 20th International Architecture Exhibition of the 2027 Venice Biennale. The 2027 British Pavilion will present a UK–Malaysia collaboration marking 70 years of diplomatic relations between the two countries. This initiative builds on the success of the UK–Kenya collaboration at the 2025 British Pavilion, which received La Biennale’s Special Mention award.
The open call for 2027 invited proposals that challenge contemporary architecture and respond to the British Council’s UK–Malaysia Human-Nature programme, which explores the relationships between people, place and the natural environment. From a shortlist of six proposals, the selected team was chosen by a panel of architects, educators and cultural professionals from the UK and Malaysia, chaired by Sevra Davis, Director of Architecture, Design and Fashion at the British Council.
The project will be led by UK-based curators Dr Guan Lee and Mike Lim, together with a curatorial team including Maria McLintock and Ben Swaby Selig. They will work closely with Penang-based artisans Ng Chi Wang, Lee Shao Chin and Koh Eng Keat. The commission will explore themes of impermanence in architecture, diaspora culture, and the ways migration transforms living traditions in Malaysia and beyond.
Drawing on Malaysian traditions of ritual paper architecture, the installation will reference temporary structures made from recycled paper on bamboo frames, inspired by the Hungry Ghost Festival, where ceremonial forms are created, used and then released.
Sevra Davis, Director of Architecture, Design and Fashion at the British Council, said the project celebrates 70 years of UK–Malaysia relations and highlights how architecture, ritual and cultural memory intersect. She added that the exhibition builds on the success of the UK–Kenya collaboration in 2025 and continues the British Council’s commitment to cultural connection through the Venice Biennale.
The curatorial team described the project as a celebration of diasporic culture and living traditions shaped by migration. They noted that the Hungry Ghost Festival, which involves ritual acts of care for ancestors and wandering spirits, informs a construction tradition where impermanence is a guiding principle rather than a limitation. They added that the idea of building for disappearance represents a radical form of architectural thinking.
Jazreel Goh, Country Director Malaysia at the British Council, said the collaboration offers an opportunity to celebrate UK–Malaysia creative exchange on a global stage, while reflecting on ritual architecture, migration and regenerative design as timely and relevant themes.
Pei Tsen Yeoh, Director of YTL Construction and a member of the selection committee, said the chosen proposal successfully integrates conceptual ambition with practical delivery, presenting a culturally grounded and sensitive approach. She noted that framing ritual architecture as a model for regenerative futures offers both poetic depth and contemporary relevance.
The Selection Committee for the 2027 British Pavilion includes representatives from architecture, design, culture and heritage institutions across the UK and Malaysia, chaired by Sevra Davis of the British Council.
The curatorial team brings together diverse expertise. Dr Guan Lee, a Malaysia-born architect and academic, is the founder of Grymsdyke Farm and Associate Professor at the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London. Mike Lim, a British architect of Malaysian heritage, is co-founder of IDK, a London and Paris-based studio known for major cultural projects including the David Bowie Centre at V&A East Storehouse and upcoming work for Tate Modern and the V&A.
Maria McLintock is a curator, writer and lecturer with experience across major institutions including the Design Museum London, MoMA New York and Ikon Gallery. She is also involved in research on migration systems and will begin a PhD at The Bartlett, UCL. Ben Swaby Selig is a London-based curator and sound artist working at V&A East, whose practice explores material culture, technology and sensory engagement across public programmes and installations.
The Malaysia-based artisan team includes Ng Chi Wang and Lee Shao Chin of Lian Yin Art in Penang, specialists in traditional paper and bamboo craft, and Koh Eng Keat of 358 Custom Effigies Workshop in George Town, who continues a family tradition of producing paper effigies and sculptural works, some of which have been exhibited internationally.
Together, the collaboration brings together architecture, craft and cultural memory to explore how traditions of making and impermanence can inform contemporary architectural thinking on a global stage.
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