The inaugural Dwell Vision Award, designed to "celebrate excellence in innovation and skill in the fields of architecture or interior design," has been awarded to New York based Amanda Schachter and Alexander Levi of SLO Architecture for "Harvest Dome 2.0". According to Dwell, "the gigantic Harvest Dome structure, made from recycled materials, captured the imagination of the judges by emphasizing the human connection to nature and New York’s waterways, often overlooked by the urban population."
Harvest Dome 2.0, funded by a MCAF grant from the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, is a 24-foot diameter cupola made from over 450 reclaimed umbrellas that floats on 128 empty two-liter soda bottles through the New York City waterways. Its purpose is to reveal a circadian cycle of tides at the northern tip of Manhattan, home to one of the islands last remaining saltmarshes.
Among the award's finalists were "Building with Bed Frames" by Bundit Kanisthakhon of Tadpole Studio and "Orongo Station" by Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects. Selected from near to 300, they were judged by editorial staff from Dwell, including Pedro Gadanho (Curator for Contemporary Architecture at the MoMA), Carey Smith (CEO of the Big Ass Fans company who sponsored the event), and Amanda Dameron (Editor-in-Chief) who said that "the jury was so pleased to see the result of hundreds of innovative minds at work. [...] The process of making the final selection for the first-ever Dwell Vision Award was daunting but extremely heartening - good design ideas educate us all, lead to action, and transform our modern world."
The Dwell Vision Award, which is designed to "give weight to projects that are technically and artistically ground breaking and which show a new method, material or concept that is pushing modern design forward," will commence its 2014 series during next year's Dwell on Design, New York (DODNY).
Reference: Dwell
