SHIFTBoston: Glow CompetitionSponsor: SHIFTBoston, LightBoston, Friends of Copley Square
Type of competition: Open, International
Language: English
Location: Boston, MA
Eligibility: Open internationally to all artists, architects, urban planners, sculptors, lighting designers, and landscape architects.
Registration Fee: None
Jury: Ana Bassat – Architect, Principal of b720 Helmut Bien – Director of Luminale and Luminapolis.com Bill Kenney – General Manager of Copley Place Simon Property Group Mark Loeffler – Lighting Designer, Director of Atelier Ten Otto Piene – Painter, Artist, Lighting Sculptor Nader Tehrani – Principal of NADAAA Paul Zaferiou – Lighting Designer, Principal of Lam Partners Awards: Three teams will be selected as winners of the first round. The winning teams will present their proposals at the GLOW Forum event in
March 2012 to members of the jury, fellow designers, lighting manufacturers, government, academic, community and business leaders. The three proposals will become part of a postcard series in the Boston Metropolitan area during March and April of 2012. Winning teams will be given two months to work with a professional from Boston Light Source to develop lighting specifications for their proposal. In April of 2012, the jury will review the three final proposals and select the one that is most technically feasible and suitable to the overall program goal. The winning proposal will be featured as part of the upcoming Copley Square Hotel Anniversary celebration and planned for installation in 2013. All eligible entries will be promoted on the SHIFTboston blog and website and will become part of the SHIFTboston GLOW book in 2012. Timeline: 3 February 2012 – Submissions Deadline Design challenge:
Entrants are challanged to create a new approach for lighting Copley Square. SHIFTBoston is seeking proposals which will capture the beauty of the existing fabric in this unique urbanscape. Lighting design concepts should highlight existing monuments, fountains and landscaping features in the square. Proposals should demonstrate coordinated structural and pedestrian lighting of the entire space, rather than focusing exclusively on the architecture.
For more information, go to: http://shiftboston.org/competitions/2012glow.php
Contact Information: competitions@shiftboston.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/ Hangang District Urban Design International Master Competition
1st place entry by Dominique Perrault Architecture (image ©Dominique Perrault Architect)
China’s planning priorities for their urban areas experienced a sharp turn after the post-Mao reforms took place. During the early post-WWII period, when Soviet influence in the early urbanization of China dominated, industrial development took precedence over all other issues, with heritage, conservation, residential planning, and the amenities associated with it, being almost entirely neglected. Read more…
Winning design by ©Moreau Kusunoki /Genton
Although one might normally assume that local firms participating in a competition might have a clear advantage over foreign competitors, this has seldom been the case: just see Sydney’s Opera House, won by a Danish architect, and Toronto’s City Hall, won by a Finn—as evidence that well devised competition briefs as adequate documentation can create a level playing field for potential competitors, regardless of their location.
Read more…
Jensen Architects – Winning entry (Honor Award) Beginning in 2011, Architecture at Zero, a collaboration between the Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and the California chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIACA), was established to investigate the role architecture might play in reducing energy consumption in the built environment. Since then, every year has seen a new site and building type selected as a design challenge in what has become one of the world’s most interesting international competitions.
As a sign of its mounting popularity, the competition received 237 registrations from 49 countries and, according to the professional adviser, about 150 entries— all this during the Covid-19 virus pandemic, when all were compelled to work from home. Read more… An Ideas Competition in Opposition to a Concrete Design
Entry by TheeAe (Image © TheeAe)
In early 2020, a group advocating a new approach to the design of the Los Angeles Museum of Art (LACMA)—The Citizens’ Brigade to Save LACMA—organized a competition to counter an existing design by the Swiss Architect Peter Zumthor. Already commissioned by the LACMA administration, the project is slated to begin almost immediately with the demolition of four LACMA buildings—three existing and one new. Moreover, the existing plan to incorporate all of the existing collections under one roof isn’t covered by the Zumthor plan. This obvious lack of exhibit space was the focus of a query by the Ahmanson Foundation, a major donor of artworks to LACMA in the past. Upon not receiving assurances from LACMA that those donated works would be exhibited, but possibly held in storage and hidden from public view, the Foundation cut all ties with LACMA. Finally, the plan by Zumthor foresees the new structure not only occupying much of the new space created by demolition, but extends part of the new building over Wiltshire Boulevard. As one might anticipate from Zumthor, the construction of the structure is also primarily of concrete, thereby raising the cost per SF. So no matter how highly finished this material turns out to be, it does in essence represent a brutalist structure replacing an eclectic ensemble. Read more… National Railway Museum Central Hall (U.K.)
Winning entry by Feilden Fowles (image © Fielden Fowles)
If one were to search for a railway museum in the U.K., London would seem to be an obvious choice. But, as it happens, its location is in the northeastern city of York, far from the major cultural and economic centers of the country. But despite its distance from the major metropolitan areas to the south and west, York has managed to become the focal point of research into the history of rail in the U.K., supplemented by a major museum. Here we are not just talking about some posters, but sheds replete with a large collection of vintage trains. Read more… |
