Sponsor: University of California, Berkeley Type: International, Essay – Travel and Fellowship competitions Number of entries: 79 Topic: How do Civic Buildings Create Community? Awards: • For the eight Finalists, there is the “best of the best” First, Second and Third Prizes, and five Honorable Mentions totaling 35,000USD. • In addition, and in lieu Read more…
Sponsor: Kaizhou New City Management Committee of Deyang City Type: International, ideas, one-stage Location: Kaizhou New City, located east of Deyang City, Sichuan Province, covers two towns, Jisqing and Xinglong, with an administrative area of 200 sq. kilometers. The New City is 64 kilometers from the urban area of Chengdu and located within the Read more…
Sponsor: The Département of the Alpes-Maritimes, France Type: Open, international Eligibility: To professionals: – Landscape architects, landscapers, landscaping companies and landscape gardeners; – Architects, designers, artists, developers, scenographers, decorators. To students involved in the final year of the Landscape Architecture School. Languages: French and English Timetable: 10 July 2020 – Documents submission Read more…
Create a 2020 Vision for Sudbury’s Urban Core in 2050 Sponsor: McEwen School of Architecture (MSoA) in collaboration with the community Type: International, open, ideas Fee: none Language: English Location: Sudbury, Ontario Eligibility: (1) Design professionals and (2) students registered in a full-time program Timetable: 28 August 2020 Read more…
Submission extended to 1 July 2020 because of the COVID-19 Pandemic https://www.urbanconfluencesiliconvalley.org
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Photo courtesy Architects Newspaper The passing of Bill Menking represents the loss of one of our most important voices in the architecture world of publishing and criticism. Bill was interested in all facets of design, and regarded design competitions as an instrument to push the design envelope. My initial encounter with Bill occurred Read more…
Sponsor: Shenzhen Natural History Museum, Shenzhen, China Competition organizer: Engineering Design Management Center of Bureau of Public Works of Shenzhen Municipality Type: International, tender process (There are the Invitation Stage, Open Call and Pre-qualification Stage, Design Competition Stage and Final Evaluation Stage.) Fee: none Languages: English and Chinese Timetable: 22 April 2020 – Questions Read more…
Sponsor: Archdiocese of Vienna Competition organizer: ARGEWO, Vienna Type: EU, open, registered architects Fee: none Language: German Process: Open anonymous process for ideas and realization To register, please go to the organizer’s website below Timetable: 4/17/2020 – Competition registration begins 6/22/2020 – Submission deadline Awards: Total awards – €137,000 Design challenge: A campus intended Read more…
Sponsor: Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts Type: International, open, RfQ, tender process Fee: none Languages: English, Chinese Process: International firms must collaborate with a local Taiwan firm For details of this project, please download the tender document from the “Government E-Procurement System”. Timetable: 10 May 2020 – Submission of qualification documents Challenge: Kaohsiung Museum Read more… |
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… |