Archinect - News

Congress moves closer to passing law funding recreation spaces in underserved communities

2024-04-11T11:46:00-04:00

The U.S. House of Representatives has passed the Outdoors for All Act, which seeks to address the lack of adequate recreation space in underserved communities. The bill, which is yet to pass the U.S. Senate, would establish a dedicated source of funding for the existing Outdoor Recreation Legacy Partnership Program.

Overseen by the National Park Service, this program funds the delivery of new parks, the renovation of existing recreation facilities, and the development of infrastructure to support outdoor education and public land volunteering. The program gives priority to projects in underserved communities.

Related on Archinect: ASLA New York honors state's best landscape architecture at 2024 Design Awards. Image credit: Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates

“Research confirms what our bodies and nature already understand — more time in outdoor spaces increases well-being,” said Torey Carter-Conneen, CEO of the American Society of Landscape Architects, which has advocated for the bill...

An anonymous architect comments on the need for ‘degrowth’ in detailed manifesto

2022-08-15T09:00:00-04:00

Environmentalist blog Treehugger has published an exchange between the author of an anonymous new Twitter manifesto that outlines in 25 points the need to combat the capitalistic notion that endless growth is the only option for modern industrial societies. Patrik Schumacher and others are mentioned as examples of the industry’s bad side, with groups like Architects Declare and thinkers such as Tim Jackson, Jason Hickel, and Open City director Phineas Harper being cited as the clarions of a movement the latter says is more or less inevitable.

"We use 'degrowth' because, as architects, we sometimes get to control the consumption spigot a bit," shares the author and architect, who wished to remain anonymous during their conversation with Lloyd Alter of Treehugger. "Someday architects may be called upon, first and foremost, to make spatial interventions that create value for society and for future generations—more like caretakers or repairmen, and less as heroic form-givers who functio...

New York City selects team to design a report and public portal for tracking environmental injustices

2022-07-18T16:32:00-04:00

Buro Happold and urban design nonprofit Hester Street have announced a partnership with the New York City Mayor’s Office of Climate and Environmental Justice to establish an environmental justice report and online data portal that will identify the locations across the city where policies, infrastructure, and investments contribute to inequities in vulnerability and risk from environmental hazards.

The report, coined the Environmental Justice for All Report, and web portal will be accessible to the public and inform the creation of a comprehensive environmental justice plan. The initiative will outline areas of focus for promoting environmental justice in New York City and analyze existing policies, programs, and procedures across the city.

The creation of the report and portal is the result of Local Laws 60 and 64, environmental justice legislation passed by the City Council and signed by former Mayor Bill de Blasio in 2017. Local Law 60 requires that a citywide study of environme...

The University of Arizona launches Indigenous Resilience Center, addressing environmental issues

2021-09-17T13:31:00-04:00

The University of Arizona is launching a new interdisciplinary center that will partner with Native American nations to work on projects that address environmental issues.

Called the Indigenous Resilience Center, the program will be a partnership between Native nations and the university’s Arizona Institutes for Resilience, Agnese Nelms Haury Program in Environment and Social Justice, and multiple faculty members and academic programs that focus on supporting the resilience of Indigenous communities.

The center’s faculty and staff will work directly with tribal leaders and governments to co-design community-driven solutions that address issues facing Native communities, such as climate change. Projects will focus on areas including agriculture, solar energy, off-grid water resources, food resources, Native plant adaptation, and health.

Karlet...

New Zealand architects join international climate emergency declaration

2019-09-28T15:00:00-04:00

New Zealand architects have had enough. With the effects of climate change impacting the globe, several nations have declared an urgent international climate emergency. After UK architects issued the Architects Declare initiative in May 2019, several other countries such as Italy, Norway, Canada, and Australia have joined the movement.

According to New Zealand's ArchitectureNow publication, "The declaration takes the form of an open letter and states, The twin crises of climate breakdown and biodiversity loss are the most serious issue of our time. Buildings and construction play a major part, accounting for nearly 40 per cent of energy-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions whilst also having a significant impact on our natural habitats."

Banding together architects express their efforts to make changes that will help reinforce better design practices, the open letter urges architects to work with their clients to states “commission and design buildings, cities and infrastructures...

French agency questions Foster + Partners' Marseille airport expansion and its environmental impacts

2019-08-08T18:22:00-04:00

The Autorité Environnementale (AE) has issued a statement saying a future scenarios study by the airport had underestimated the project’s environmental impact and overestimated its economic benefits. The new Terminal 1 extension is scheduled to open at the start of 2023 [...] However, it appears those plans clash with France’s new target to be carbon neutral by 2050, prompting the environmental agency to demand clarification.

In 2017, Foster + Partners' competition submission beat a proposal by Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners for the opportunity to design the new extension to Marseille Provence Airport in France. More recently, France's environmental agency has raised questions concerning the project, arguing that the project's backers had understated the environmental impact of the expansion while also overstating its potential economic impact, The Architect's Journal UK reports.

The journal shared a statement from Foster + Partners addressing their environmental intentions and plans for the expansion that reads, "We have been appointed by the Aeroport Marseille Provence to design a terminal extension on a brownfield site adjacent to Marseille Airport's terminal 1. Our sustainable design proposal will exceed the existing French HQE standard, to align with the new E+C- standard, ensuring further energy and carbon efficiency. This new standard is currently being trialed in France and is expected to come i...

For the 19th time, Los Angeles takes the crown as the smoggiest city in the U.S.

2019-05-01T19:42:00-04:00

For 20 years, the American Lung Association has gathered and analyzed data from official air quality monitors creating its annual "State of the Air" report. It's been reported by the association that more than four in ten people currently live in areas where pollution levels are too dangerous to breathe. Now several factors contribute to such poor air quality; however, during the 20 years these reports have been conducted, Los Angeles has been ranked as the city with the most polluted air quality by ozone measurements.

Sadly, the city's air quality has gotten worse since last year's State of the Air report. The data gathered analyze ozone layers in the city. The San Bernardino and Riverside counties are also included with Los Angeles' data report which affects the city's ranking tremendously. Many may view smog as an obstruction from Los Angeles' cityscape, however, the long-lasting effects of poor air quality can cause severe damage like lung cancer with a higher risk for early de...

This modern backyard bat house raises awareness on a natural form of pest control and bat conservation

2018-10-26T16:25:00-04:00

In response to the increasing number of mosquitoes and other pesky insects that climate change is bringing about, BatBnB is one company that wants people to be less reliant on harmful chemicals and pay attention to a more natural form of pest control: Bats!

Co-founded by Harrison Broadhurst (an architectural designer at Nomi Design) and Christopher Rännefors (a Sales & Operations Manager at Google Fiber), BatBnB designs stylish, bat expert-approved houses that mimic bats' natural habitat and provide them with a safe environment to sleep, stay, and raise their pups. With these houses, Broadhurst and Rännefors want to show that bats aren't the filthy blood-thirsty pests many people assume they are. In fact, bats can eat thousands of insects in one night, making them a better form of pest control.

Image via BatBnB.

Made from rot-resistant cedar, the BatBnB currently comes in three sleek designs and can be installed on a house, barn, pole, or tree. It c...

Microsoft’s undersea data center now has a webcam

2018-08-23T13:10:00-04:00

Microsoft has been experimenting with undersea data centers for years, and the current installation in the Orkney Islands will be deployed for around five years. There are 12 racks with 864 servers and 27.6 petabytes (27,600 terabytes) of storage [...] The data center is powered by a giant undersea cable that also connects it back to the internet, and the findings could mean the company will scale this project up to more powerful data centers in the future.

Microsoft has now installed a webcam by its undersea data center located off the shores of Scotland. The video stream is part of the company's efforts to observe environmental conditions of Project Natick, a research project aimed at determining the feasibility of subsea data centers powered by offshore renewable energy.

Check out the live video stream here.

As permafrost thaws, Nunavut's capital city is racing against time to save its sinking homes

2018-05-10T20:36:00-04:00

It’s difficult to build new houses on thawing permafrost, and many existing houses have huge cracks in the foundations. It is also extremely expensive to ship materials in the Arctic, so the houses that are repaired and built must be planned very carefully. [...] Permafrost thaw is not a new problem; urban planners, architects, and builders have taken its volatility into account for decades in the Arctic. But climate change exacerbates existing permafrost issues—and it does so rapidly.

In this piece by Melody Schreiber, the Nunavut capital of Iqaluit isn't only dealing with scarce housing and soaring prices, many of the town's homes are sinking — or are at high risk — as the permafrost beneath them rapidly melts.

As officials turn to new solutions like thermosyphons, with climate change transforming the entire Arctic landscape, they're also planning for a future to only build on bedrock.

This app tells you how much you're “smoking” in the city air you're breathing

2018-04-27T14:17:00-04:00

Shit, I Smoke! was created by Brazilian-born designer Marcelo Coelho and Paris-born app developer Amaury Martiny in just a week, after they read a study that analyzed air pollution and its equivalent to cigarette smoking. [...] Using the formula in [the study], [the app] uses live pollution data from hundreds of air quality stations in cities around the globe and converts the station’s PM2.5 number into the number of cigarettes being inhaled by a person in real time.

“For both Coelho and Martiny, the app isn’t only a useful tool to inform users about their city’s air quality; it also makes this information more accessible and easier to comprehend.”

Trump administration to waive environmental rules and other laws to expedite border wall construction

2017-08-02T18:04:00-04:00

The Trump administration said Tuesday that it will waive environmental reviews and other laws to replace a stretch of border wall in San Diego, moving to make good on one of the president’s signature campaign pledges. Critics including the Center for Biological Diversity criticized the move as overreach and a threat to the environment.

"Last week, the House of Representatives approved the administration’s request for $1.6 billion to start building Trump’s border wall," PBS NewsHour reports, "which would include replacing 14 miles (22 kilometers) in San Diego covered by the latest waiver and building 60 miles (96 kilometers) of new barriers in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley."

And the Rio Grande stretch, as we all know, will require some (costly) construction magic.

McGregor Coxall to design “bird airport” wetland park in Tianjin

2017-02-16T21:12:00-05:00

Australian practice McGregor Coxall had the winning scheme to transform a degenerate landfill site into a new migratory-bird wetland sanctuary park in Tianjin, China. The Asian Development Bank and the Port of Tianjin co-launched the park design competition in response to the increasing loss of critical bird habitats and declining shorebird populations in the East Asian-Australasian Flyway, which an estimated 50 million migratory shorebirds use every year. The EAAF extends to Alaska and Russia's Taimyr Peninsula in the north, East Asia and parts of Southeast Asia, and Australia and New Zealand in the south.

As a pilot project in China's national sponge city program, the project in the Lingang region is a 60-hectare masterplan of constructed wetlands, parkland, and urban forest.

Described as a “bird airport” by the architects, the wetland sanctuary will allow weary migratory birds to feed and rest, while human visitors can check out the Water Pavilion education and research center or t...

How these U.S. cities will continue to fight climate change during Trump's presidency

2016-11-22T14:48:00-05:00

What impact will Donald Trump’s league of global-warming deniers and fossil-fuel boosters have on U.S. climate action? The short-term prognosis might not be as damaging as some fear, but...it seems safe to assume that for the next four years, domestic climate policy will be in the deep freezer—while the rest of us heat up...[But] U.S. cities have the power to shrink that footprint and prepare for the worst, even in the absence of financial or regulatory support from the federal government

A quick profile at how five American cities will continue progressing toward their goals to combat climate change, even without federal support from a Trump administration and a Republican-controlled Congress.

More on Archinect:

Trump says climate change is a "hoax", yet moves to protect his properties from sea level rise

Trump pilfers Clinton's plan for an 'infrastructure bank'

Frank Gehry might bail on the U.S. now that Trump's been elected

The Rainforest Solutions Project wins the 2016 Fuller Challenge Award

2016-10-06T20:11:00-04:00

Greenpeace, Sierra Club BC, and Stand.earth formed the Rainforest Solutions Project as part of the Tides Canada Initiative. The coalition has spent nearly two decades developing a sophisticated legal and policy framework called Ecosystem-Based Management to tackle the persisting struggle over Canada's treasured Great Bear Rainforest, while also negotiating the conflicting interests of multiple groups.

Winning over six equally worthy finalist teams, the Rainforest Solutions Project addresses both natural and cultural preservation, and it enforces stronger ecological responsibility in industrial economic pursuits. The Project resulted in a landmark 250-year agreement between all stakeholders — government, First Nations, environmentalists, and logging companies — to conserve and sustainably manage the 15 million-acre Great Bear Rainforest.

“Selecting the Rainforest Solutions Project...comes at a critical point in the evolution of the Challenge itself, as design is being recognized as an integral part of business and society,” the Fuller Challenge Review Committee wrote in a statement.

Learn more about it on Bustler.

Previously:

2016 Fuller Challenge finalists announced

2016 Fuller Challenge announces 19 semi-finalist initiatives

GreenWave's 3D ocean farm initiative wins the 2015 Buckminster Fuller Challenge

Engineers grapple with a melting Alaskan Highway

2016-08-05T14:57:00-04:00

Today the highway serves as the main artery connecting the “Last Frontier” with Canada and the northwestern U.S., bringing tourists to Alaska cruise ships; food, supplies and medicine to remote towns; and equipment to oil fields and mines that are the region’s lifeblood... “Communities are unable to reach each other, it’s harder to get goods there,” [...] Thawing permafrost isn’t “just an inconvenience, folks; it’s a change in the way of life.”

More on Archinect:

Global warming is redrawing national borders

Russia considering plans for a 12,400-mile superhighway linking London and Alaska

Obama changes the name of tallest mountain from Mt McKinley to Denali

Why American infrastructure funding keeps facing such an uphill battle

Rikers Island is an environmental (and human) catastrophe

2016-03-22T18:23:00-04:00

Rikers is built on a landfill. The ground underneath the facilities is unstable and the decomposing garbage emits poisonous methane gas. In addition to extreme heat and poor air quality, flooding and crumbling infrastructure pose a serious threat, especially when superstorms like Hurricane Sandy strike. As the violence and human rights violations worsen, so do the environmental circumstances surrounding Rikers.

The article details flood-risk, extreme heat, a lack of air circulation and other air quality issues among other problems plaguing the prison.

For related content, check out some of these links:

The crisis in Flint and why architects should care about decentralizing our water systems

2016-02-10T18:02:00-05:00

...centralized urban water systems throughout the world are now under significant stress from increasing population density, water-resource competition, changing precipitation patterns, and new sources of pollutants, such as endocrine-disrupting chemicals. Even without these pressures, centralized water is, by design, a fracture-critical system—one that is susceptible “to complete and sudden collapse should any part of it fail,” writes Thomas Fisher, Assoc. AIA...

"Faced with an excessive price tag, municipalities may welcome decentralized water as the only feasible choice for future water delivery. Architects should therefore develop more expertise related to these net-zero water systems, as they will have direct implications for building design, construction, and operation."

For more on health issues related to the ecology of urban environments, check out these articles:

NYC to receive $176 million in federal funds for flood-protection proposal

2016-01-22T15:25:00-05:00

[Through a national competition by the Department of Housing and Urban Development,] The money would be used to help fortify a stretch of shoreline from Montgomery Street on the Lower East Side to the northern tip of Battery Park City. Specific measures have not yet been determined, but could include adding sea walls and temporary flood walls that could be deployed before a storm, and building grass berms that could double as recreational areas.

Not to be confused with the Rebuild By Design competition-winning proposal, "The BIG U", from 2014.

More on Archinect:

2015 Solar Decathlon winner Stevens Institute of Technology addresses post-Sandy resiliency with the SURE HOUSE

When the next disaster strikes, how resilient would future-proof cities in the U.S. be?

Relocation or Adaptation: Creating resilience against natural disaster

Beyond the Grid's vision to make a Lower Manhattan neighborhood more resilient

One CEO's plan to supply water to drought-stricken CA cities, and obviously profit from it

2016-01-20T15:14:00-05:00

Scott Slater has a plan. It is not a popular plan, but he wants to pump 814bn gallons of water from under the Mojave desert to Los Angeles and other drought-stricken communities in southern California, and make more than $2bn doing so...In addition to environmental concerns, others object to a private company being able to make billions from water. Slater says they do not understand the law, which in California states no entity can own water but they can buy, sell and trade the right to use it.

America: The land where nothing is free, indeed.

h/t New Republic

More on Archinect:

Have these heavy rains alleviated the California drought?

Thirst-quenching as Los Angeles heats up: Next Wave @ UCLA

In face of drought, San Diego's desalination efforts won't stop there

Meet the architects behind the winning Dry Futures proposals

Encroaching on the green belt: UK loosens protections on rural land

2015-12-16T17:46:00-05:00

If there is one thing Britons dislike more than their country’s housing shortage, it is the idea of building more houses. Even as a lack of homes has sent prices through the roof... cities have remained ringed by protected “green belts” of land that are off-limits to developers. Attempts to build on them provoke outcry. But on December 7th the government published a consultation on letting councils allocate “appropriate small-scale sites in the green belt specifically for starter homes”...

Canada's 2016 Venice Biennale theme digs into the country's influence in resource extraction

2015-12-09T20:26:00-05:00

Canada's national theme for the 2016 Venice Architecture Biennale will be a multimedia investigation of the country's resource extraction industry, as announced earlier this week by the Canada Council for the Arts. Titled "Extraction", the project profiles and "radically rethinks" Canada's rise as a "global resource empire" by delving into the histories, architectures, and political economies of the industry. The theme was selected as the winner of a national competition. In 2014, the well-regarded "Arctic Adaptions: Nunavut at 15" exhibition represented Canada.

Considering that the Great White North is home to 75% of Earth's prospecting and mining companies, resource extraction runs deep in the country's roots. "Extraction" will include an installation, a film, and a book featuring various perspectives drawn from history, business, art, activism, and more. Catherine Crowston of the Art Gallery of Alberta (AGA) was appointed as the project's Official Commissioner while landscape urba...

GreenWave's 3D ocean farm initiative wins the 2015 Buckminster Fuller Challenge

2015-10-22T16:04:00-04:00

The non-profit group GreenWave, which won the prestigious 2015 Buckminster Fuller Challenge, is gaining attention for designing reportedly the world's first 3D multi-species ocean farms. Much like the group's marine-oriented initiatives, the ocean farm project aims to restore ocean ecosystems and biodiversity, and work toward a blue-green economy. Another objective is to create more jobs for coastal communities that will turn fishermen into restorative ocean farmers. Restorative aquaculture was a favorite in last year's Fuller Challenge, wherein SCAPE's "oyster-tecture" proposal scored the $100,000 grand prize.

The GreenWave ocean farms are designed as zero-input "vertical underwater gardens" that consist of layers of seaweed, scallops, and mussels that grow on floating ropes, which are stacked above oyster and clam cages. These crops enable the ocean farmers to produce food, fertilizers, animal feeds, pharmaceuticals, biofuels, and other products.

A single acre of the farm would remo...

When the next disaster strikes, how resilient would future-proof cities in the U.S. be?

2015-08-14T14:45:00-04:00

'There is no one size fits all approach — every region is completely different...' Hurricane Sandy underlined the urgency by ruthlessly exposing New York's structural weaknesses...California also suffered as historic droughts settled in, and the 2014 wave of winter storms terrorized the North, emphasizing that extreme conditions were here to stay and could strike anywhere. This bought the U.S. into line with the global situation.

More on Archinect:

The Hurricane Katrina Cottages: where are they now?

Coating the LA reservoir in "shade balls" will save 300M gallons of water

How the Cascadia earthquake threatens America's coastal Northwest

The Pragmatics of Adaptating to Sea Level Rise: The Next Wave @ UCLA

U.S. Department of HUD announces the Rebuild By Design winners

Have an idea for how to address the California drought with design? Submit your ideas to Archinect's Dry Futures competition!

Will Rio's Olympic venues be ready in time for the 2016 Games?

2015-08-06T10:19:00-04:00

'When these [2007 Pan Am] venues were built the government told Brazilians that these would be Olympic-ready, and there would be a rather smooth and efficient transition to eventually hosting the Olympics,' explained Rio-based reporter Taylor Barnes...'But, these venues have instead had some pretty checkered after-lives.'

Despite a murky past of broken promises in addition to recent water-safety concerns and rampant economic turmoil, Rio de Janeiro Mayor Eduardo Paes claims construction of the venues are on schedule and will be delivered on time for the 2016 Olympics -- which will begin one year from now. Public Radio International interviews Rio-based reporter Taylor Barnes, who gives a glimpse into the reality of the situation.

More Olympic news on Archinect:

Boston backs out of 2024 Olympics bid

Toronto ventures into sixth bid to host Olympic Games

Zaha Hadid reportedly not giving up on Tokyo stadium plans

Zaha's Tokyo Olympic Stadium cancelled – Abe calls for a redesign from scratch

Harvard GSD to host talk on "Habitation in Extreme Environments: Alpine Shelter" exhibition this Friday

2015-02-11T18:58:00-05:00

Curated by Spela Videcnik, Rok Oman, and John T. Dunlop (Design Critic in Housing and Urban Development), the "Habitation in Extreme Environments: Alpine Shelter" exhibition currently at the Harvard GSD presents a prototypical alpine shelter that students designed in an option studio this past fall. A public lecture and discussion by Spela Videcnik will formally introduce the topic this Friday, February 13 at Gund Hall. The exhibition and lecture are free and open to the public.

Guided by instructors Spela Videcnik and Rok Oman of Ljubljana-based OFIS arhitekti, the studio focused on investigating architectural solutions and responses to extreme climatic conditions, specifically referring to the ongoing heavy wintry conditions that ravage the North region of the U.S. The students researched traditional European alpine settlements in an effort to find new architectural solutions fit for a North American context.

The prototype shelter that will be presented at this Friday's lecture prov...

Arup Germany/SolarLeaf, Studio Tamassociati, and Elemental win in 2014 Zumtobel Group Award

2014-09-26T21:12:00-04:00

The winners for the 2014 Zumtobel Group Award were recently honored at an awards ceremony in London...According to jury chairman Winy Maas (MVRDV principal), although voting for the winners was very close in all three categories, the jury distinguished the winners based on the key factor of innovation — in regards to technicality, planning, and ecological and social challenges.

From 356 submissions to 15 nominated projects, three winners were selected in the categories: BUILDINGS; URBAN DEVELOPMENTS & INITIATIVES; and the newly added APPLIED INNOVATIONS.

BUILDINGS winner: Port Sudan Paediatric Centre by Studio Tamassociati, Italy

URBAN DEVELOPMENTS & INITIATIVES winner: PRES Constitución by Elemental, Chile

APPLIED INNOVATIONS winner: SolarLeaf with Arup Deutschland GmbH

More photos and other details of each project on Bustler.

You can also watch jury commentary videos on each winner right below.

A closer look into “The BIG U”, BIG’s winning proposal for Rebuild By Design

2014-06-03T19:22:00-04:00

From yesterday's announcement of the Rebuild By Design winners by the U.S. Department of HUD, we've got more details behind "The BIG U" by the BIG Team, who had one of the six winning propoals. The BIG-led consortium was awarded $335 million to implement their proposal for New York's Lower Manhattan, with the goal to increase the neighborhood's resiliency to future storm disasters. And with a name like "The BIG U", one can only be curious to find out more.

Read more about the proposal on Bustler.

U.S. Department of HUD announces the Rebuild By Design winners

2014-06-02T20:40:00-04:00

The winners of the Rebuild By Design competition were finally revealed! The global competition sought out the best local and resilient design solutions that would help rebuild the Eastern Seaboard cities affected by Hurricane Sandy...Out of the 10 invited multidisciplinary teams, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) selected the six winners, who were announced today by Secretary Shaun Donovan.

BIG U by the BIG Team for New York, New York

Living with the Bay: A Comprehensive Regional Resiliency Plan for Nassau County’s South Shore by the Interboro Team for Long Island, New York

New Meadowlands: Productive City + Regional Park by MIT CAU + ZUS + URBANISTEN for The Meadowlands, New Jersey

Resist, Delay, Store, Discharge: A Comprehensive Strategy for Hoboken by OMA for Hoboken, New Jersey

Hunts Point Lifelines by PennDesign/OLIN for Bronx, New York

LIVING BREAKWATERS by SCAPE / Landscape Architecture for Staten Island, New York

Winning design solutions will be implemented through CDBG-DR funding in addition to other public and private-sector funding sources.

Find out more on Bustler.

Jose M. Ahedo wins the 2014 Wheelwright Prize

2014-05-21T21:07:00-04:00

Architect Jose M. Ahedo of Studio Ahedo from Barcelona was named as the 2014 recipient of the Wheelwright Prize. The competition pool started with nearly 200 applications from 46 countries and then to seven finalists who were announced in April. For its second year as an open international competition, the Harvard Graduate School of Design awards the $100,000 travel fellowship to an early-career architect whose proposal best conveys original, scholarly, and professional design.

After a second stage of deliberation, the jury selected Ahedo and his proposal, "Domesticated Grounds: Design and Domesticity Within Animal Farming Systems", which focuses on the architectural and organizational models of animal farming.

"Noting that livestock is a significant cause of land degradation, greenhouse gas emissions, social friction, and problematic development worldwide, Ahedo proposes to research a wide range of practices, from industrial operations driven by 'techno-capitalist policies' to informal or vernacular farms that have grown out of traditions. 'These two distinct production modes coexist in both developed and developing countries,' Ahedo writes in his essay, observing that neither responds adequately to the innumerable environmental and social challenges related to animal farming today."