Between June and December 2021, we organised an Ideas and Sketches Students Competition for students of universities and schools of architecture validated by the RIBA or invited to participate by the RIBA, in the four international regions: Americas, Asia & Australasia, Europe, Middle East & Africa.
Reimagining cities and towns post-COVID
The competition brief
The COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown measures put in place across the world have meant that people have dramatically changed their lives. Families have had to adapt to working and living in the same space. People have shown capacity to adapt to new circumstances and to change the way they live, work, and organise themselves.
While we all adapted to working from home, cities have become empty.
Have cities become obsolete? Is there a need to rethink our cities and include the management of future crises (be it another pandemic, climate change, or other) in our design? How do we design cities and spaces that are multifunctional, better places to live and work, which respond to current and future challenges and add to these new needs as we emerge from the pandemic?
Students of universities and schools of architecture validated by the RIBA or invited to participate by the RIBA, in the four international regions (Americas, Asia & Australasia, Europe, Middle East & Africa), were invited to think of concepts/ideas on how to design buildings and cities/towns of the future as we emerge from the pandemic.
Cities/towns and buildings that are multi-functional; resilient to future crisis (climate change or health crisis); more sustainable; that provide good quality of life and better places to live and work for communities; and respond to the pressures of population growth and social inequalities.
Additionally, we asked students to consider how the pandemic has affected the way we experience, think and design public spaces? How can we move biodiversity into designing cities that are more inclusive with nature?
Submissions
The schools all worked on the same brief. However, each regional competition had a different timetable to comply with the different starts of academic year/terms in the four regions.
The competition followed a two-phase open ideas competition format.
Phase 1
We invited each participating School of Architecture in each international region to circulate the brief to potential competition entrants within their schools; to encourage entries from their students; and to hold an internal assessment with a view to select a maximum of five entries to be submitted to the RIBA to go forward to the final competition assessment. Each school chose its own method of selection.
Phase 2
An evaluation panel of six architects assessed and selected the winner from the entries submitted by each school of architecture in each international region. All entries are evaluated anonymously to ensure fairness to entrants.
Update
Over the four international regions, we received 73 entries from 20 schools (out of 34 participating schools). The four Evaluation Panels took place in September and December 2021 and have identified the four regional winners.
The four Evaluation Panels were composed of six architects each, as described below:
Asia and Australasia Region
- Odile Decq – Chair
- Prof. Paula Velasco
- Manuel Ferreyra luque
- Agustin Moscato
- Carlos Arroyo
- Prof. Ayman Wanas
Americas Region
- Dr Clarissa Rhomberg – Chair
- Dr Davide Lombardi
- Arch. Jayantha Perera
- ZHUANG Shen
- Dr Jens Christian Pasgaard
- Nicolas Hannequin
Middle East and Africa Region
- John Latto – Chair
- Dr Lindsay Howe
- Rocío Margarita Cacho Cruz
- Nasurudin Hasbullah
- Dario Vanegas-Vargas
- Dr Rune Christian Bach
Europe Region
- Prof. Ruan Xing – Chair
- Prof. Suzette Michel Aziz
- Lucia Hollman
- Ar. Azman Zainonabidin
- Prof. Nicolás Stutzin
- Prof. Hassan Abdel Salam
Results
We will be announcing the four regional winners on 23rd February 2022, during a hybrid ceremony that will take place in the UK Pavilion at Expo 2020 in Dubai. The ceremony will be live-streamed, and the link to watch online will be shared nearer the date.
In the lead-up to the announcement of the four winners, we will be exhibiting all the entries on Instagram and on our website.
For more information, contact emmanuelle.meunier@riba.org.
Find out more about the Ideas and Sketches Students Competition organised in 2020 for students in RIBA validated schools in Colombia.
