Forest Green Rovers Stadium and Eco Park: Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK
Images © Zaha Hadid Architects
Zaha Hadid Architects has won an invited international competition to design the Forest Green Rovers Stadium, part of an eco-friendly complex in Stroud, Gloucestershire. The competition was actually staged in three phases, with almost 50 firms from around the world participating in the first stage. After a jury shortlisted nine entries from the initial competition phase to participate in the next round, two teams, Zaha Hadid Architects and Glenn Howells Architects, both from the UK, were provided with an honorarium to fine-tune their designs in a third and final stage of the process. Two other firms AFL Architects (Manchester) and George King Architects (London) were “highly commended” on their designs. Of special note was the emphasis placed on sustainability as illustrated by the extensive use of wood in the Zaha Hadid design, serving to underline the significant ecological nature of the project and the environment where it is to be located. 
The nine shortlisted firms were: - AFL Architects, Manchester, UK
- DP Architects, Singapore
- George King Architects, London, UK
- Gianni Botsford Architects, London, UK
- Glenn Howells Architects, Birmingham, UK
- Richard Kroeker, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
- Studio M12, Morden, Surrey, UK
- Zaha Hadid Architects, London, UK
- ZedFactory, Wallington, UK
The subject of the competition was the design of an innovative new 5,000 capacity stadium for Forest Green. The new stadium will be the centerpiece of the £100million Eco Park development, a 100-acre sports and green technology business park proposal beside junction 13 of the M5 in Gloucestershire. Half of Eco Park will consist of state-of-the-art sporting facilities, including the new stadium, grass and all-weather training pitches, publicly accessible multi-disciplinary facilities, and a sports science hub. 
The other half will comprise a green technology business park with sustainably built commercial offices and light industrial units, giving Eco Park the potential to create up to 4,000 jobs, including room for the continued expansion of green energy company Ecotricity, which has submitted the overall proposal and is already the biggest employer in Stroud with 700 employees located across four sites. The proposal will also see the development of a nature reserve on the site, a potential public transport hub, including a Stroud Park and Ride, as well as help with the restoration of the Stroudwater canal. |
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.
Read more…
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… |
