On April 15, 2010, President Barack Obama announced an ambitious strategy for expanding human presence out into the solar system. On the way to Mars, the nations of the world will demonstrate solution for living in deep space indefinitely, and for building on planets. The discovery of water on the moon fundamentally changes the practical value of our nearest neighbor. After learning about where it is and how it is concentrated, we can learn to collect and purify it. And then we can use it to support human life and for rocket propellant. Now is the time to re-think the moon as a destination for human enterprise.

Photo: NASA

What could be a better study model for renewable energy – thinking about how to build a self-sustaining city on the moon may help us break free of our dependence on fossil fuels here on Earth. How about the moon as a laboratory to prepare for exploring other planets and as a new tourist destination? SHIFTboston calls on all architects, artists, landscape architects, urban designers, engineers, and anyone else who would like to tackle the question: what if – what, when – these things happen on the moon?

This competition is intended to collect and inspire. Through sources such as blogs, editorials, advertising and exhibition, SHIFTboston will promote the most radical ideas gathered in this competition. The goal is to attract greater public interest in future possibilities for human expansion into the solar system, and in elements of self-sustaining cities of the future – efficient cities – that no longer rely on fossil fuel.

The honorary recipient will receive a cash prize and present at the SHIFTboston Moon Capital Forum celebration in Boston on Thursday, October 21, 2010. The winning entry will be displayed in a new online virtual moon tourism world, in addition to a post cards series and book. All eligible entries will be promoted on the SHIFTboston blog and website and will become part of the SHIFTboston Moon Capital Exhibition.

Submission deadline is September 3, 2010. Click here for more information about the Moon Capital Competition.

Archiprix International invites all universities and colleges teaching architecture, urban design and landscape architecture to select 1 graduation project and to ask the designer(s) to submit the selected project for participation. Designers who have graduated since July 1 2008 are eligible. The selected designer must be registered by the school by August 1st, 2010 and projects must be received at MIT by September 1st, 2010. The projects will be presented in the exhibition, on the website and in a book with DVD. The designers of the projects will be invited for the workshops taking place in May/June 2011 in Cambridge, USA. Participation is free of charge.

Over 1400 faculties from more than 100 countries have been invited to take part. This makes Archiprix International by far the biggest competition for recently graduated architects, urban designers and landscape architects. No other competition for young talented designers displays such a broad insight in world-wide trends in education and the fields of architecture, urban design and landscape architecture in general.

After successful editions in 2001 in Rotterdam, 2003 in Istanbul, 2005 in Glasgow, 2007 in Shanghai and 2009 in Montevideo, Archiprix Interna-
tional will again stage a unique presentation of the world’s best graduation projects. Archiprix International 2011 takes place in May/June 2011 in
Cambridge, USA. This fifth edition will be hosted and co-organised by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture + Planning. The
SA+P boasts an illustrious history stretching back nearly a century and a half, providing the current students with a legacy and long tradition of pioneering
excellence. The Department of Architecture was the first such department in the nation (1865) and became a leader in introducing Modernism to America.

For more details and the latest news, please visit the official website at archiprix.org or the MIT host website at mit.edu/archiprix.

Starting September 19th, Sukkah City will pop-up at Union Square Park, New York City. Sukkah City consists of twelve radically temporary structures built by competitors form all over the world. Anyone is invited to submit designs. The sukkah is an ephemeral, elemental shelter, erected for one week each fall, in which it is customary to share meals, entertain, sleep, and rejoice.

“New York City will re-imagine the ancient Sukkah phenomenon, develop new methods of material practice and parametric design, and propose radical possibilities for traditional design constraints in a contemporary urban site. Twelve finalists will be selected by a panel of celebrated architects, designers, and critics to be constructed in a visionary village in Union Square Park from September 19-21, 2010. (…) One structure will be chosen by New Yorkers to stand and delight throughout the week-long festival of Sukkot as the Official Sukkah of New York City. The process and results of the competition, along with construction documentation and critical essays, will be published in the forthcoming book ‘Sukkah City: Radically Temporary Architecture for the Next Three Thousand Years’.”

More about the Sukkah and about the competition:

“Ostensibly the sukkah’s religious function is to commemorate the temporary structures that the Israelites dwelled in during their exodus from Egypt, but it is also about universal ideas of transience and permanence as expressed in architecture. The sukkah is a means of ceremonially practicing homelessness, while at the same time remaining deeply rooted. It calls on us to acknowledge the changing of the seasons, to reconnect with an agricultural past, and to take a moment to dwell on — and dwell in — impermanence. (…) Historically, the sukkah’s permanent recurrence is not as a monument, archetype, or typology, but as a set of precise parameters. The basic constraints seem simple: the structure must be temporary, have at least two and a half walls, be big enough to contain a table, and have a roof made of shade-providing organic materials through which one can see the stars. Yet a deep dialogue of historical texts intricately refines and interprets these constraints–arguing, for example, for a 27 x 27 x 38-inch minimum volume; for a maximum height of 30 feet; for walls that cannot sway more than one handbreadth; for a mineral and botanical menagerie of construction materials; and even, in one famous instance, whether it is kosher to adaptively reuse a recently deceased elephant as a wall. (It is.) The paradoxical effect of these constraints is to produce a building that is at once new and old, timely and timeless, mobile and stable, open and enclosed, homey and uncanny, comfortable and critical.”

Royal Haskoning, the Delta Alliance and the City of Rotterdam invite students from all over the world to enter the third edition of the DeltaCompetition and develop practical, innovative, sustainable solutions to the threats facing delta cities. The organization is looking for new, inspiring and daring ideas and practical solutions from a wide combination of disciplines that integrate urban development and flood risk reduction, fresh water provision and energy production, housing and sustainable infrastructure development, (water) transport and rainwater catchment, and/or smart tools to improve urban development policy, implementation and enforcement and water governance in delta cities.

The best three will receive an award with a prize of € 3,000 each. Furthermore, the three winning participants are invited to present their ideas to an international audience of decision makers and experts during the Deltas in Times of Climate Change symposium, to be held in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, from 28 September to 1 October 2010.

What to do with the big hole in downtown Chicago? That essentially is what the Chicago Architectural Club wants to know. Therefore they announced the competition ‘Mine the Gap’.

“‘Mine the Gap’ is a single-stage international design ideas competition dedicated to examining one of the most visible scars left after the collapse of the real estate market in Chicago: the massive hole along the Lake Michigan shore that was to have been—and may yet be—the foundation for a singular 150-story condominium tower designed by an internationally-renowned Spanish architect, a tower which was to have become a new icon for the city and region. What to do with the gap? Whether or not the project is resuscitated, what else can we do with this strategic and highly-charged site? Once the motor of real-estate speculation has stalled, what can we use to propel ourselves, and the discipline, forward?”

More information about entry fee, jury, deadlines and registration can be found at the Chicago Architectural Club’s webpage. Competitors may submit material online anytime between March 22, 2010 and May 3, 2010. Registration is open, and may be completed anytime before the deadline. The first prize is $ 3,500, the second is prize $ 1,500 and the third prize is $ 750. Up to 3 Honorable Mentions will be awarded.

Friday November 20, 5 pm, The Forum, NAI. Admission is free.

Every Friday afternoon during the Open City Event Program, a local “cultural ambassador” hosts a performance, presentation or discussion related to the theme of the week. Tomorrow evening, Lilet Breddels of VOLUME magazine will present artist Thomas Kilpper and his project/competition for A Lighthouse for Lampedusa! Following a film and short lecture by Kilpper, a discussion with curator Marina Sorbello will explore the possible role of art and architecture in socio-political issues.

A Lighthouse for Lampedusa!
Almost every day there are news reports of refugees arriving at Europe’s southern shores. In 2008, about 30,000 refugees reached Europe via the Italian island of Lampedusa. Thousands drown in the sea—aid organizations estimate that one out of ten migrants die during this dangerous crossing. For the relatively small island of Lampedusa, with about 4,000 inhabitants, the endless stream of arriving migrants causes a lot of practical problems, bringing the administration to the brink of collapse. In 2008, the refugee center reached breaking point when up to 2,000 people were held in confinement under cramped conditions, in a space designed for a maximum of 700 people. Instead of helping Lampedusa to ease the situation on the ground and to relocate the migrants to the mainland like in the past, the Italian government further escalated the problem when it insisted that the detained migrants be kept on the island, and to erect a second detention- and deportation-center for them. In January 2009, the islanders went on a general strike against these plans, using the slogan: “No Alcatras in Lampedusa.” Participants expressed their desire to live on an open island: “To live from tourism and to welcome the poorest of the poor if they arrive…” (quotation of the Mayor of Lampedusa, 2009)

So far there is no end of the stream of refugees in sight. What can be done to prevent these tragic deaths? Efforts to improve and sustain living conditions in the immigrants’ country of origin would, if successful, last for decades, if not generations. Since 2007, the Berlin based artist Thomas Kilpper has pursued the idea of constructing a “Lighthouse for Lampedusa,” which is to have a double function: to provide essential orientation at sea and help to navigate refugee boats into safety, and to house a museum and cultural center, which the island still lacks. The Lighthouse is conceived as a tower and a landmark building, capable of hosting a diverse and trans-national program of communication, negotiation, exhibitions, concerts and other cultural events on its ground floor. It would serve as a place that attracts not only new visitors to the island but also local people—making Lampedusa not just a location to talk about, but also a place to learn from and listen to the ideas of others.

The refugee crisis of Lampedusa cannot be solved via military protection of the coastline or the declaration of a “state of emergency.” An international ideas competition will be launched in collaboration with the 4th International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam—“Open City: Designing Coexistence” — and Volume Magazine, calling for architects, planners, artists, and activists to develop imaginative architectural solutions for a lighthouse, museum and cultural center situated on the island. “Lighthouse for Lampedusa” calls for a humanitarian and fair immigration and integration policy in Europe based on the respect of a refugee’s human rights. Since Alexandria’s magnificent structure from 300 BC, lighthouses have been associated with welcoming strangers: Can 21st century Europe afford a different “wonder” of welcome—this time at its own shore?

4th International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam IABR
Open City: Designing Coexistence
www.iabr.nl/en/opencity

“Powered by the Sun”

8-21 October 2009, Washington DC

Solar Decathalon 2009, US Department of Energy

About Solar Decathlon

For three weeks in October 2009, the U.S. Department of Energy will host the Solar Decathlon—a competition in which 20 teams of college and university students compete to design, build, and operate the most attractive, effective, and energy-efficient solar-powered house. The Solar Decathlon is also an event to which the public is invited to observe the powerful combination of solar energy, energy efficiency, and the best in home design.

Exact dates of the 2009 event are:

• Oct. 8-16—Teams compete in 10 contests
• Oct. 9-13—Houses are open to the public
• Oct. 15-18—Houses are open to the public
• Oct. 19-21—Teams disassemble their houses.

The Solar Decathlon houses will be open for public tours 11 a.m. –3 p.m. Monday–Friday and 10 a.m.–5 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays. Please note that all homes will be closed Wed., Oct. 14.

The Solar Decathlon consists of three major phases:

• Building: This is where most of the work—and the learning—happens. In addition to designing houses that use innovative, high-tech elements in ingenious ways, students have to raise funds, communicate team activities, collect supplies, and work with contractors. Although the Solar Decathlon competition receives the most attention, it’s the hard work that students put in during the building phase that makes or breaks a team.
• Moving to the Solar Village: When it’s time for the Solar Decathlon, the teams transport their houses to the National Mall in Washington, D.C., and rebuild them on site.
• Competing: During the competition itself, the teams receive points for their performance in 10 contests and open their homes to the public.

Purpose

The Solar Decathlon brings attention to one of the biggest challenges we face—an ever-increasing need for energy. As an internationally recognized event, it offers powerful solutions—using energy more efficiently and using energy from renewable sources.

The Solar Decathlon has several goals:

1. To educate the student participants—the “Decathletes”—about the benefits of energy efficiency, renewable energy and green building technologies. As the next generation of engineers, builders, and communicators, the Decathletes will be able to use this knowledge in their studies and their future careers.
2. To raise awareness among the general public about renewable energy and energy efficiency, and how solar energy technologies can reduce energy usage.
3. To help solar energy technologies enter the marketplace faster. This competition encourages the research and development of energy efficiency and energy production technologies.
4. To foster collaboration among students from different academic disciplines—including engineering and architecture students, who rarely work together until they enter the workplace.
5. To promote an integrated or “whole building design” approach to new construction. This approach differs from the traditional design/build process because the design team considers the interactions of all building components and systems to create a more comfortable building, save energy, and reduce environmental impact.
6. To demonstrate to the public the potential of Zero Energy Homes, which produce as much energy from renewable sources, such as the sun and wind, as they consume. Even though the home might be connected to a utility grid, it has net zero energy consumption from the utility provider.

More info can be found at www.solardecathlon.org

Register deadline: July 24, 2009 / Submit deadline: August 7, 2009
Student Edition Register deadline : October 16, 2009 Submit deadline: November 2, 2009

WPA 2.0 “Whoever Rules the Sewers Rules the City”

Paraphrasing the earlier WPA (Works Progress Administration) of 1939, this WPA (Working Public Architecture) is seeking to exploit the potential of the infrastructure investments of the Obama administration as a opportunity to exhibit the power of architecture’s imagination is applicable to more than generating icons. Architects are called upon to take back the streets, to apply their architectural intelligence beyond the traditional boundaries of their discipline.

cityLAB, an urban think tank at UCLA’s Department of Architecture and Urban Design, announces a call for entries to “WPA 2.0: Working Public Architecture.” WPA 2.0 is an open competition that seeks innovative, implementable proposals to place infrastructure at the heart of rebuilding our cities during this next era of metropolitan recovery. WPA 2.0 recalls the Depression-era Works Projects Administration (1935-43), which built public buildings, parks, bridges, and roads across the nation as an investment in the future—one that has, in turn, become a lasting legacy. We encourage projects that explore the value of infrastructure not only as an engineering endeavor, but as a robust design opportunity to strengthen communities and revitalize cities. Unlike the previous era, the next generation of such projects will require surgical integration into the existing urban fabric, and will work by intentionally linking systems of points, lines and landscapes; hybridizing economies with ecologies; and overlapping architecture with planning. This notion of infrastructural systems is intentionally broad, including but not limited to parks, schools, open space, vehicle storage, sewers, roads, transportation, storm water, waste, food systems, recreation, local economies, ‘green’ infrastructure, fire prevention, markets, landfills, energy-generating facilities, cemeteries, and smart utilities.

Beyond the mere replacement of obsolete or overtaxed infrastructure, WPA 2.0 seeks design ideas that exploit the opportunity for such solutions to be leveraged, through nested scales of thinking, into strategies that catalyze a larger and more visible public benefit. In this respect, it is looking for proposals that put architecture back to work through designs that:

- are embedded with added value (multifunctionality, imageability, public presence),
- represent potential prototypes, adaptable for use in numerous locations,
- are locally self-regulated and controlled (i.e. which “unlock” the grid),
- strategically attract investment and/or generate community stability, and
- generate new sustainability practices.

The full brief for the competition can be found on the WPA 2.0 website, and to get your brain up and running on the vast realm the competition is engaged with check their infrastructure matrix, reference projects and resources.

Deadline: 1 august 2009

Crisis! What Crisis?

Suburbia is getting its fair share of attention currently and with reason. As prophesied Volume’s 2006 #9 issue, the urgency to reinvent the suburban mode of living has never been greater. In order to address this urgency Dwell Magazine and Inhabitat.com have announced the Reburbia competition: a design competition dedicated to re-envisioning the suburbs.

With the current housing crisis, the sub-prime mortgage meltdown, and rising energy costs, the future of suburbia looks bleak. Suburban communities in central California, Arizona and Florida are desolate and decaying, with for sale and foreclosure signs dotting many lawns. According to the US Census, about 90% of all metropolitan growth occurred in suburban communities in the last ten years. Urbanites who loathe the freeways, big box stores and bland aesthetics stereotypical of suburbia may secretly root for the end of sprawl, but demographic trends indicate that exurban growth is still on the rise.

In a future where limited natural resources will force us to find better solutions for density and efficiency, what will become of the cul-de-sacs, cookie-cutter tract houses and generic strip malls that have long upheld the diffuse infrastructure of suburbia? How can we redirect these existing spaces to promote sustainability, walkability, and community? It’s a problem that demands a visionary design solution and we want you to create the vision!

Calling all future-forward architects, urban designers, renegade planners and imaginative engineers:
Show us how you would re-invent the suburbs! What would a McMansion become if it weren’t a single-family dwelling? How could a vacant big box store be retrofitted for agriculture? What sort of design solutions can you come up with to facilitate car-free mobility, ‘burb-grown food, and local, renewable energy generation? We want to see how you’d design future-proof spaces and systems using the suburban structures of the present, from small-scale retrofits to large-scale restoration—the wilder the better!

for more information check the Reburbia competition website