THE Singapore Sports Hub has scored gold at this year's World Architecture Festival, beating out international entries in the Sport - Completed Building category.

The hub, which opened in June, faced tough competition from five other entries from around the world. These included the NTFSH Gymnasium in Taiwan and the WMS Boathouse, a rowing centre and training facility, at Clarke Park in Chicago.

The awards handed out at the three-day event, which started on Wednesday, are considered the Oscars of the architecture world.

More than 200 architectural projects are competing in 29 categories such as completed educational and cultural buildings.

Today, the teams were given 10 minutes to present their projects and answer questions from a jury after that. The sports hub project, which took about eight years to be designed and built, was presented to three judges by DP Architects director Seah Chee Huang, 39, and Mr Clive Lewis, 43, associate director at Arup Associates - two companies which were part of the hub's design team.

Mr Seah said: "We're extremely happy to have won because the competition is very strong. It's a unique project with a grand ambition. Not only did it have to be a world class sporting arena, it had to be relevant to the local community."

There were 14 other Singapore projects which were shortlisted, including the Sandcrawler building designed by Aedas in the Office Building category and Christ Methodist Church by K2LD Architects in the Religion - Completed Buildings category

The seven-year-old festival is being held in Singapore for the third time, at Marina Bay Sands.

A final coup for the Sports Hub will be winning the event's biggest award, Building of the Year, which will be announced on Friday night. The award winners in the 29 categories compete for the award.

Mr Seah said: " We're competing against the best projects in each category. Right now, it's anybody's guess."