2009-10 Leading Edge Student Design CompetitionSponsor: nbi, California Energy Commission, PG&E, Southern California Edison, SMUD, AIA Type: Student Language: English Eligibility: The competition is open to currently-enrolled undergraduate and graduate students of architecture, engineering, drafting, and environmental design entering as individuals or teams. The competition may be treated as a class project or a separate independent study. A faculty member must supervise all participants. Registration Fees: none Awards: Student First Place: $3,000 Second Place: $2,000 Sponsoring Institution First Place: $1,500 Second Place: $1,000 Time Line: 26 March 2010 – Final Registration Deadline 09 April 2010 – Final Deadline for Submission of Questions 16 April 2010 – Final Posting of Questions and Answers on the Website 11 June 2010 – Deadline for Receipt of Entries 27 August 2010 – Winners notified and posted on the Website 10 September 2010 – Judges Comments Posted Jury: Gregg D. Ander, FAIA Vivian Loftness, FAIA Nancy Clanton, PE, FIES, IALD, LC, LEEP AP Design Challenge: The 2009/2010 Leading Edge Student Design Competition seeks to support and enhance the study of sustainable and energy-efficient building practices in architectural education. Students and instructors of architecture and design are invited to use the competition as a framework to explore the use of new materials and strategies for building, and the integration of aesthetics and technology for highperformance, cutting-edge architecture that approaches the goal of zero-net energy use. A zero-net energy building generates enough on-site renewable energy to equal or exceed the amount of energy needed to operate the building. This is also known as netzero site energy. Since a significant proportion of the nation’s use of fossil fuels comes from heating and cooling buildings, creating zero-net buildings is an important way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and fight global warming. This year the competition focuses on the coastal city of Long Beach, California. Students entering Challenge 1 will design a zero-net energy Workforce Training Center; students entering Challenge 2 will design a zero-net energy Student Residence. The projects will be located on adjacent sites on Long Beach Boulevard. Submission Requirements: Entrants to challenge one may submit two or three 30”x40” boards arranged with the 40” edge vertical. Entrants to Challenge 2 should submit two 30”x40” boards arranged as above. Additionally, each entry must include a brief narrative of approximately 750 words, somewhere on the face of the board, discussing the overall energy efficiency and environmental sustainablility aspects of the design. For more information, go to: http://www.leadingedgecompetition.org/ |
Young Architects in Competitions When Competitions and a New Generation of Ideas Elevate Architectural Quality  by Jean-Pierre Chupin and G. Stanley Collyer published by Potential Architecture Books, Montreal, Canada 2020 271 illustrations in color and black & white Available in PDF and eBook formats ISBN 9781988962047 What do the Vietnam Memorial, the St. Louis Arch, and the Sydney Opera House have in common? These world renowned landmarks were all designed by architects under the age of 40, and in each case they were selected through open competitions. At their best, design competitions can provide a singular opportunity for young and unknown architects to make their mark on the built environment and launch productive, fruitful careers. But what happens when design competitions are engineered to favor the established and experienced practitioners from the very outset? This comprehensive new book written by Jean-Pierre Chupin (Canadian Competitions Catalogue) and Stanley Collyer (COMPETITIONS) highlights for the crucial role competitions have played in fostering the careers of young architects, and makes an argument against the trend of invited competitions and RFQs. The authors take an in-depth look at past competitions won by young architects and planners, and survey the state of competitions through the world on a region by region basis. The end result is a compelling argument for an inclusive approach to conducting international design competitions. Download Young Architects in Competitions for free at the following link: https://crc.umontreal.ca/en/publications-libre-acces/  Aerial view of site – Courtesy National Finnish Museum When major cultural institutions in Finland plan a new building project, one can almost always assume that an open competition will be the vehicle by which the client settles on the building’s design. The only question is, will this be organized in a format open to local, Scandinavian, or international architects. In the case of the National Museum of Finland annex competition, it was open to architects throughout the world — resulting in 185 entries. Read more…
The Opening of Taichung’s Central Park by Catherine Mosbach/Philippe Rahm
 View from the south with downtown Taichung in the distance image: ©Mosbach/Rahm
The abandonment and closing of airports, including decommissioning those that were used for military purposes, has presented design communities with several opportunities to convert them entirely to civilian purposes. Notable among those which have been the result of competitions are Orange County Great Park, Irvine, California (Ken Smith Landscape Architects), The Estonian National Museum (Dan Dorell, Lina Ghotmeh and Tsuyoshi Tane), and Toronto’s less successful Downsview Park competition, whereby the winning design by OMA, with trees as the primary feature, has been basically ignored. Instead, the area has become the site of numerous commercial and residential projects.
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SMAR’s Winning Entry Gets the Green Light  Image: ©SMAR Architecture The winning competition entry in the 2016 Science Island competition in Kaunas, Lithuania by SMAR Architects may only take five years to realize—from the date of the competition to completion. This is encouraging news, as the duration of such projects resulting from a competition can often take much longer—sometimes up to 8-10 years. Read more…  Night view of the memorial tapestry from Independence Avenue, with Gehry’s sketch of the Normandy cliffs. Explaining the contributions of a World War II hero and later President of the United States on a very modest site on Independence Avenue just off the Washington Mall is tantamount to asking an author to describe the life of this person in no more than one paragraph. But on September 17th, after a long and bumpy journey, lasting almost 20 years and navigating a warren of the DC approval processes and public scrutiny, the Eisenhower Memorial finally was dedicated and opened to the public. Designed by Frank Gehry, it has received mixed reviews, the majority being more positive. But most have pointed out that the memorial is more impressive at night than in full daylight. This is due primarily to the illumination of an almost block-long metallic tapestry—featuring a sketch by Gehry, which depicts his interpretation of the cliffs of the Normandy coastline where the Americans landed on D-Day. Read more…  Professional winner: Brooklyn Bridge Forest (image © Pilot Projects Design Collective) While looking for new adventures on a visit to New York City, friends suggested that I take time to walk across the Brooklyn Bridge—certainly a New York icon. For those intending to undertake this trek across the bridge for the first time, the bridge consists of layers, with a large platform for pedestrians on top of a lower level for cars and the metro system. Traversing this connection for the first time between Manhattan and Brooklyn is not just about getting from one place to another, but experiencing a great scenic view of both boroughs and occasionally interacting with other bridge crossers. As for the latter, they provide a flavor of the city’s demographics, as opposed to similar experiences one might have of the city’s inhabitants when riding the city’s subway system. Read more… |