The Architectural League of New York has announced the 6 winners of 2021 Prize for Young Architects + Designers Awards, the North American annual competition that celebrates the works of young architects and designers who have completed their bachelor’s or master’s degree within the last ten years. This year's theme was Housekeeping, which asked participants to explore how the domestic settings have changed over the past couple of years, changing the definition of "ideal residence".
The competition is organized by The Architectural League’s program director Anne Rieselbach and program manager Catarina Flaksman. The 2021 theme was chosen by the 2021 Young Architects + Designers Committee, along with previous winners of the prize Ivi Diamantopoulou, Cyrus Peñarroyo, and Alison Von Glinow. In addition to the members of the committee, the jury included a set of renowned architects and designers such as Tatiana Bilbao, Peggy Deamer, Fritz Haeg, and Victor J. Jones.
Read on to meet the 6 winners of the competition as chosen by the Architectural League of New York's Committee.
For some people, layers of dust went unnoticed until their living rooms had to double as workplaces. In other cases, household chores have provided respite from digital devices that require their own form of upkeep to optimize performance. Housekeeping implies oversight and control, maintenance and responsibility. It is as much a necessity as it is a ritual: an act of labor, but also an act of care. That said, it is impossible to think about housekeeping without considering its constitutive role in systemic oppression on the basis of gender, race, and class. -- Architectural League of New York
Winners of the 2021 Architectural League Prize for Young Architects + Designers
Tei Carpenter of Agency—Agency
New York, NY and Toronto, Canada
Founded by Tei Carpenter, Agency—Agency is based in New York, NY, and Toronto, Canada. The practice “seeks out an expanded role for architecture by engaging buildings, objects, interiors, infrastructures, speculations, and environments”. In 2019, the studio was recognized as one of Architect Magazine‘s Next Progressives and Domus‘s 100 Best Architecture Firms. Previous work done by the studio has been exhibited in several exhibitions such as the Oslo Architecture Triennale, Venice Biennale, and Center for Architecture.
Rodrigo Escandón Cesarman and Ricardo Roxo Matias of APRDELESP
Mexico City, Mexico
APRDELESP is a Mexico City-based studio founded in 2012 by Rodrigo Escandón Cesarman, Ricardo Roxo Matias, and Guillermo González Ceballos. The office focuses on “practice-as-research on space and its appropriation.” APRDELESP aims to welcome unexpected encounters and discussions through the creation of self-managed “subspaces” such as cafes, galleries, print shops, furniture stores, and event spaces. The studio has participated in the 2016 Venice Architecture Biennale, the 2017 Chicago Architecture Biennale, and the 2018 Lisbon Architecture Triennale.
Liz Gálvez of Office e.g.
Houston, TX
Houston-based Office e.g was founded by Liz Gálvez in 2018. As described in her League Prize entry, her work “focuses on the interface between architecture, theory, and environmentalism through an examination of building technologies." Gálvez held the 2018 William Muschenheim Fellowship at Taubman College of Architecture & Planning, University of Michigan, and received the 2016 Seebacher Prize for the Fine Arts from The American Austrian Foundation. She is the winner of the Rice Design Alliance Houston Design Research Grant 2021.
Ilse Cárdenas, Regina de Hoyos, Diego Escamilla, and Juan Luis Rivera of Palma
Mexico City and Sayulita, Mexico
Based in Mexico City and Sayulita, Palma was founded in 2016 by Ilse Cárdenas, Regina de Hoyos, Diego Escamilla, and Juan Luis Rivera. Navigating between typologies in both urban and rural contexts, the practice aims to improve communities through inventive work. Palma’s work has been published in Arquine’s Arquitecturas Mexicanas: Lo mejor del siglo XXI (2015–2016, 2017–2018, and forthcoming 2019–2020) and exhibited at Harvard Graduate School of Design, Museo de la ciudad de Mexico, and Archivo Diseño y Arquitectura.
Germane David Barnes of Studio Barnes
Germane David Barnes directs Studio Barnes, a Miami-based practice founded in 2016. According to his League Prize competition entry, the studio “explores the many rituals and narratives associated with Blackness in America,” examining “underrepresented contributions and legacies while creating new architectural possibilities that emerge within investigations of Black domesticity.” Barnes’s work is included in the MoMA exhibition Reconstructions: Architecture and Blackness in America. He is the 2021 winner of the Wheelwright Prize and will be a 2021–22 Rome Prize Fellow at The American Academy in Rome.
Lindsay May of Studio Mayd
Washington, DC
Lindsey May founded her Washington, DC-based firm, Studio Mayd, in 2017. The studio’s competition entry provided a holistic approach to its residential projects and argued persuasively that unglamorous but critical aspects of architectural practice, from developing project proposals to compensating employees, merit greater attention and recognition in order to foster a more sustainable, equitable discipline. In 2020 May received the inaugural Architect + Educator Award from the AIA|DC, as well as the Dean’s Award and the Outstanding Educator Award from the School of Architecture, Planning & Preservation, University of Maryland.
News and winners profile via The Architectural League of New York Committee