The International Interior Design Association (IIDA) has named winners of its 41st Interior Design competition, celebrating “outstanding and innovative” interior design “that encourages new ideas and techniques.” In addition to this, the IIDA announced the 22nd winner of its annual Will Ching competition, which recognizes “originality and excellence in commercial design from firms with five or fewer employees.” Preview all the winners, after the break.
The National Museum in Norway has been chosen to curate the Nordic Pavilion for the 2014 Venice Architecture Biennale, in collaboration with the Museum of Finnish Architecture, the Swedish Centre for Architecture and Design in Stockholm, and architectural firm Space Group. The exhibition, “FORMS OF FREEDOM: African Independence and Nordic Models” will study modern Nordic architecture’s role in the liberation of East Africa during the 1960s and 70s.
Architects von Gerkan, Marg and Partners (gmp), with partners JB Ferrari, have won first prize in an international competition to design a new children’s emergency unit at the Lausanne University Hospital in Switzerland. The 85-bed hospital will feature a terraced inner courtyard with conservatory, which will serve as a protected outside play area, that offers ample natural light and space for plant-life.
The American Institute of Architects (AIA) and the American Institute of Architecture Students (AIAS) have committed themselves to pushing a bill that would provide U.S. architecture graduates student loan relief in exchange for community service, an offer already granted to lawyers and doctors. The bipartisan legislation, known as the National Design Services Act (NDSA), was introduced today in an effort to free young professionals from the crushing cost of education (architecture being one of the disciplines with the highest loan balances) and aspire them to contribute their design service to the betterment of their communities. Learn more, here, and sign the petition in support of NDSA.
Silvio d’Ascia Architecture, Omar Kobité Architecture and Eric Giudice Architects have been announced as winner of an international competition to design the new TGV high-speed railway station in Kénitra. The winning design aims to unite the northern and southern parts of the city by providing two entryways joined by one geometrical volume whose triangular framework recalls traditional shapes found in vernacular Moroccan architecture.
The Royal Architectural Institute of Canada has named Peter Busby the 2014 recipient of the RAIC Gold Medal, the highest honor awarded by the organization. Since founding his Vancouver practice in 1984, Busby has built a reputation for being a “powerful catalyst in the growth of the green architecture movement,” a pioneer in sustainability. In 2004, Busby merged his firm with Perkins+Will. He now serves as the Managing Director of Perkins+Will’s San Francisco office. More information on Busby and the award, here.
The Municipal Art Society (MAS) of New York has announced New York Times architecture critic Michael Kimmelman as winner of the 2014 Brendan Gill Prize, a cash award presented annually to the creator of a specific work that “best captures the spirit and energy of New York City.” Kimmelman is being recognized, as President Vin Cipolla described, for his “insightful candor and continuous scrutiny of New York’s architectural environment” that is “journalism at its finest.” See why they singled out his coverage on the challenges of Penn Station, here.
Steven Holl has, again, teamed up with Spirit of Space to produce two short films on the recently completed Sifang Art Museum. In the first video (above) Holl explains the project’s inspiration - the mysteries of parallel perspective seen in early Chinese paintings - and how the design subtly distorts any concept of a vanishing point at the ground level yet contrasts this notion in the upper galleries by framing the distant view of Nanjing. In the second video (after the break), Spirit of Space allows you to experience this space by revealing it from all perspectives and scales.
See the second video, after the break…
Portuguese Architect Ines Lobo has won the second edition of the arcVision Prize - Women and Architecture, an international social architecture award instituted by the Italcementi Group. Commended by the jury for being a “versatile architect,” Lobo has built a reputation for “creatively attacking complex architectural problems” at a variety of scales “within the existing urban fabric.”
The City of Denver has launched “Imagine 2020,” a pro-arts cultural plan that will pave the way for more city-wide “art opportunities” over the next seven years. According to the Denver Post, this initiative will include the revision of “plans, permits and codes” to allow for more installations, offer small micro-art grants for residents and neighborhoods, and establish large public gathering places throughout the city. You can learn more, here.
UPDATE: SO-IL has broken ground on UC Davis' new campus art museum. Completion is slated for 2016.
The University of California, Davis has selected emerging New York-based practice SO-IL to design a new campus’ art museum, which is envisioned to be a “regional center of experimentation, participation and learning.” SO-IL, selected from three finalists following an intensive five-month design competition, will collaborate with San Francisco-based Bohlin Cywinski Jackson and national construction firm Whiting-Turner to complete the project.
UC Davis Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi believes the winning design has turned the traditional notion of museum design inside out, as SO-IL’s concept will engage visitors with a sequence of interconnected interior and exterior spaces that are defined by curved glass walls and capped with a 50,000 square foot steel canopy. At night, the “Grand Canopy” will illuminate from within, establishing a new focal point for the campus and beckoning drivers along Interstate 80 between San Francisco and Lake Tahoe.
“How can a $3.94 billion building be made to look cheap?” A small part of Santiago Calatrava’s World Trade Center Transportation Hub has been opened to the public, and the critics aren’t impressed. According to the New York Times’ article by David Dunlap, the buildings "chunky fixtures" and "rough workmanship" "detract from what is meant to be breathtaking grandeur." Read more, here.
Tadao Ando has been commissioned to design his first New York City building. Though little information has been released, the residential development firm Sumaida + Khurana has closed a deal with the Japanese architect to design a 32,000 square foot, eight-unit, luxury condominium building at 152 Elizabeth Street in Nolita. Construction is expected to begin later this year and the building will be completed in 2016.
Tsinghua University, alongside New York-based Studio Link-Arc, has been announced as winners of a competition to design the Chinese Pavilion at the 2015 Milan Expo. Expanding on the Expo’s overarching theme, “Feeding the Planet - Energy for Life,” the pavilion’s “Land of Hope” is centered on the idea that “hope can be realized when nature and the city exist in harmony.”
The American Institute of Architects’ New York Chapter has announced the 2014 Design Award winners. Selected from nearly 400 submissions, the 35 awardees were commended for their “design quality, response to context and community, program resolution, innovation, thoughtfulness, and technique.” Of the 35 awards conferred, 13 received Honor Award Medals. The winners, after the break...
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Eyebeam, a non-profit art and technology center currently based in Manhattan, has commissioned WORKac to design its future Brooklyn home. Planned for the corner of Lafayette Avenue and Ashland Place, within a mixed-use development designed by Dattner Architects and Bernheimer Architecture that will include market-rate and subsidized housing as well as a restaurant, the 27,000 square foot cultural facility will accommodate for the organization’s world-renowned artist residency program, diverse public programming and innovative education offerings for adults and teens. According to the developer, Jonathan Rose Companies intends to break ground next year with completion slated for late 2016.
The City of Montpellier has chosen Sou Fujimoto Architects, Nicolas Laisné Associés and Manal Rachdi Oxo architects’ “White Tree (L’Arbre Blanc)” as winner of the "Architectural Folie of the 21st Century" competition. Inspired by the city’s tradition of outdoor living, and the efficient properties of a tree, the mixed-use residential tower will feed off locally available natural resources as it rises 17-stories and connects the new and old districts of Montpellier.
Eight multidisciplinary teams have been selected to move forward in the second stage of competition to design the UK Pavilion for the 2015 Milan Expo. Drawing inspiration from the theme “Grown in Britain: Shared Globally,” the teams will now envision proposals that showcase Britain’s contribution in research, innovation and entrepreneurship to the global challenges addressed by the overarching exposition theme, “Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life.” Presentations will commence mid-April and a winner will be announced in May. View the selected teams, after the break.