Gyo Obata Photo: courtesy HOK
If there are milestones in the world of architecture, the passing of Gyo Obata certainly marked one. Obata, along with Cesar Pelli, Richard Rogers and Helmut Jahn, belonged to a group of designers that had strong international connections, sometimes based on family histories. A second generation American born to a Japanese ... Read more...
Geneva Suburban Project as Urban Housing Model
©Bauen+Wohnen
An article, Trois tourettes et un jardin (Three Turrets and a Garden) by Swiss landscape architect, Valérie Hoffmeyer, in Werk, Bauen + Wohnen, is another recent example highlighting the value of green space in the design of mid-rise residential buildings. At a time when developers endeavor to maximize their ... Read more...
From RUR’s Competition Winning Design to Final Realization
RUR Taipei Pop Music Center performance hall view with artwork ©Philip Colbert
Whether large or small, design competition or straight commission, projects from design phase to realization can stretch over extended periods of time. It was no different with Taipei’s Pop Music Center, which took over ten years from ... Read more...
Richard Rogers (1933-2021)
Image ©faber & faber
Could you imagine that a person who is anything but adept at drawing, and also dyslexic, would become one of the world’s great architects? Meet Richard Rogers, who was full of ideas, but engaged collaborators to fully realize them. One might even assume that Rogers choice of architecture as a ... Read more...
National Library of Korea Data Preservation Center Competition
Winning entry – Timeless Corridor’ of Shinhan Architects & Engineers Co., Ltd. (principal, Kim Sanghoon) and D&B architecture design group (principal, Cho Doyeun)
Retrofitting existing buildings is nothing new. The abandonment of old factory structures, especially in the northeast of the U.S., has been occurring at a rapid pace ... Read more...
Countryside Dilemmas – New Rural Planning
1st Place – ©Tianjin University Team
Planning used to be at the bottom of Chinese students’ lists of design priorities. One western architect, whose firm was at the forefront in the design and implementation of numerous planning projects in China, surmised that planning was an area that received little attention in ... Read more...
Public Pool Image: ©Perkins&Will
The Chicago Architecture Club Shines the Spotlight on
Another Endangered Landmark
What do Bertrad Goldberg and Helmut Jahn have in common? Besides having high-profile buildings threatened by demolition, both served as subject matter for two competitions sponsored by the Chicago Architecture Club (CAC)—raising public consciousness about their impending fate. They both produced ... Read more...
An Ideas Competition in Berlin Seeks Answers
Winning entry perspective Image: ©AllesWirdGut Architekten
Berlin developer HOWOGE recently staged what was regarded as a “planning Laboratory” competition for a model satellite in northwest Berlin. The brief for this invited competition noted that the urban sprawl, which had accompanied the reunification of Germany(and Berlin) in 1989, was low density ... Read more...
Image: ©wHY Architecture
Earlier this year, an article in the Architects’ Journal described what almost sounded like a death knell for wHY Architecture’s winning competition design for Edinburgh’s Ross Pavilion site. When the competition took place, some observers may have regarded wHY as a wild card, in the company of such high-profile firms as BIG and ... Read more...
Astrakhan Looks to Raise Its Quality of Life Index
Aerial view of downtown Astrakhan
Planning competitions with a strong landscape component take many forms, including some for plazas and gateways to major town centers, city neighborhood sites with multi-story housing units, university campus plans and finally, comprehensive city plans—the latter either being for new towns, as in ... Read more...
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1st Place: Zaha Hadid Architects – night view from river – Render by Negativ
Arriving to board a ferry boat or cruise ship used to be a rather mundane experience. If you had luggage, you might be able to drop it off upon boarding, assuming that the boarding operation was sophisticated enough. In any case, the arrival experience was nothing to look forward to. I recall boarding the SS United States for a trip to Europe in the late 1950s. Arriving at the pier in New York, the only thought any traveler had was to board that ocean liner as soon as possible, find one’s cabin, and start exploring. If you were in New York City and arriving early, a nearby restaurant or cafe would be your best bet while passing time before boarding.
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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
Wwhat 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/
Helsinki Central Library, by ALA Architects (2012-2018)
The world has experienced a limited number of open competitions over the past three decades, but even with diminishing numbers, some stand out among projects in their categories that can’t be ignored for the high quality and degree of creativity they revealed. Included among those are several invited competitions that were extraordinary in their efforts to explore new avenues of institutional and museum design. Some might ask why the Vietnam Memorial is not mentioned here. Only included in our list are competitions that were covered by us, beginning in 1990 with COMPETITIONS magazine to the present day. As for what category a project under construction (Science Island), might belong to or fundraising still in progress (San Jose’s Urban Confluence or the Cold War Memorial competition, Wisconsin), we would classify the former as “built” and wait and see what happens with the latter—keeping our fingers crossed for a positive outcome.
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2023 Teaching and Innovation Farm Lab Graduate Student Honor Award by USC (aerial view)
Architecture at Zero competitions, which focus on the theme, Design Competition for Decarbonization, Equity and Resilience in California, have been supported by numerous California utilities such as Southern California Edison, PG&E, SoCAl Gas, etc., who have recognized the need for better climate solutions in that state as well as globally. Until recently, most of these competitions were based on an ideas only format, with few expectations that any of the winning designs would actually be realized. The anticipated realization of the 2022 and 2023 competitions suggests that some clients are taking these ideas seriously enough to go ahead with realization.
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RUR model perspective – ©RUR
New Kaohsiung Port and Cruise Terminal, Taiwan (2011-2020)
Reiser+Umemoto RUR Architecture PC/ Jesse Reiser – U.S.A.
with
Fei & Cheng Associates/Philip T.C. Fei – R.O.C. (Tendener)
This was probably the last international open competition result that was built in Taiwan. A later competition for the Keelung Harbor Service Building Competition, won by Neil Denari of the U.S., the result of a shortlisting procedure, was not built. The fact that the project by RUR was eventually completed—the result of the RUR/Fei & Cheng’s winning entry there—certainly goes back to the collaborative role of those to firms in winning the 2008 Taipei Pop Music Center competition, a collaboration that should not be underestimated in setting the stage for this competition
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Winning entry ©Herzog de Meuron
In visiting any museum, one might wonder what important works of art are out of view in storage, possibly not considered high profile enough to see the light of day? In Korea, an answer to this question is in the making.
It can come as no surprise that museums are running out of storage space. This is not just the case with long established “western” museums, but elsewhere throughout the world as well. In Seoul, South Korea, such an issue has been addressed by planning for a new kind of storage facility, the Seouipul Open Storage Museum. The new institution will house artworks and artifacts of three major museums in Seoul: the Seoul Museum of Modern Art, the Seoul Museum of History, and the Seoul Museum of Craft Art.
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