Pandemic Architecture Internation Ideas Competition

OPEN CALL - PANDEMIC ARCHITECTURE INTERNATIONAL IDEAS COMPETITION

Pandemic Architecture is an International Ideas Competition curated by the Design Ambassador for ARCHISEARCH.gr

 

“Extraordinary times” require extraordinary design. What Can Architecture Do for our Health?

On 17 November 2019, a COVID-19 case was first reported in Wuhan, Hubei, China. On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization declared the outbreak a pandemic, as over 138,000 cases have been confirmed in more than 130 countries and territories and at least 3,300 people have died from the disease.  Over the course of a few days, the lives of millions of people have drastically changed.

Public health responses around the world have included travel restrictions, curfews, event cancellations, school closures as well as quarantines of all of Italy and the Chinese province of Hubei. In the name of public security, state authorities have implemented screening methods at airports and train stations and excessive coronavirus public monitoring, such as facial recognition technology that can detect elevated temperatures in a crowd or flag citizens not wearing a face mask, while apps use the personal health data of citizens. 

In the meanwhile, millions of people are isolated inside a new type of bunker. In the Hubei Province, a new 25 thousand square meter hospital was constructed in only 10 days. Worldwide effects of the pandemic also include social and economic instability, xenophobia and racism and “voluntary prisoners” encouraged by stay-at-home movements.

Architecture shapes Disease cities. When the needs of citizens change, so do their cities and their homes.

There is a strong connection between health and architecture. Since ancient times, health care has been associated with the construction and use of specialized medical buildings and structures. Architecture helps shape the quality of our environments and can contribute to health and wellbeing. Topics concerning health have always been stimulating architectural innovations at different scales:  territorial and urban development projects as well as architectural and interior design.  

Health has often stimulated speculative design and experimental proposals within the architectural discipline as many works of famous architects, such as Alvar Aalto,  Franco Albini, Ignazio Gardella and the theories of Le Corbusier, give attention to the psychological and physical well-being.  Furthermore, hospitals adopted architectural features thought to promote health and limit disease spread while architects designed operating rooms and clinical spaces for utilitarian purposes — namely, maintaining a well-lit, aseptic environment. During the cholera outbreak in London, in 1856, Frederick Marrable was assigned to design the Metropolitan Board of Works in order to provide sanitary infrastructure.

Pandemic Architecture

In today’s largely urban and interconnected world, infectious disease outbreaks and other public health emergencies pose a real threat to large cities. Pandemic Realities addresses the spatial configurations, modes of living, and notions of the human body engendered by disruptive public health crises such as Covid-19 outbreak.  

As the world faces new globalized health threats, there is a need to design the home/ the city of tomorrow, living in times whereas pandemics and viruses will be part of our everyday life. 

By designing for the needs of a pandemic reality, architects act as guarantors and guardians of the Public Health of a community.   Virus outbreaks have their impact on urban space as well as on the living of millions of people.

In managing any public health crisis, the design of a city will have two overall tasks:

• dealing with the sudden large number of sick people 
• keeping city life as normal as possible for everyone else

First, in the case of an emergency due to an epidemic or pandemic disease, a city is confronted with large-scale needs in supplies, medical spaces and cemeteries.  Second, designing places of living in the future should not only take into account functional spaces for individual and collective needs, but should also protect health, as humans spend more and more of their time isolated in built spaces.

When millions of people are isolated and working from home, what features should a home have? When people can't travel, what is the role of the hotels? When crowds are not allowed at public spaces, how cities and public spaces change? In terms of health centres and interior design, what are the hygienic architectural details of the pandemic reality? 

Pandemic Architecture Competition attempts to open up a dialogue and create a think tank, looking for ideas from the architectural and design community about the future of the living, the workspace, the public space and the tourism industry. 

Urbanists, architects, designers, students, artists, performers and authors are invited to submit their ideas on Pandemic Architecture.  Proposals should be based on a realistic situation or on science fiction and should focus on territorial and urban development projects or architectural and interior design. 

 “…. Maybe something concretely practical? Buildings that can self-clean, that have features that make it easier to self isolate, bigger freezers, reserve freezers/pantries in basements so apartment buildings get the features a typical US home has, with those freaky garages full of huge freezers (obviously these wouldn't run during good times, just be there so people can hunker down if needs be.)

 Built in Skype screens or some sort of screen comms in each flat so people who might not have laptops can communicate.  (There was a sad scene from Spain, one retirement home completely infected and on lockdown, staff don't pick up phones and relatives can't get ahold of their parents, don't even know if they're sick. Bodies cremated immediately to prevent spreading the disease so maybe not even a funeral? This guy was trying to force his way in to check on his dad but they wouldn't let him in.) OK, very corona centric but it seems that we have to expect this will continue in various forms.

 Ability to grow food on rooftop terraces, sides of buildings, some sort of hoist-system so you can sow, maintain and harvest...

 Absence of touch and human company -  things that can alleviate loneliness...big soft shapes you can stroke or cuddle up to? AI pets or servants?

 These things will matter more in the end than 'luxurious' touches like marble bath rooms. Ability to air out houses effectively also important…..” — thoughts came from someone recovering from a manageable case of the CV-19

 

 

Rethink/ReDesign 1. Emergency design (City Strategies, Hospitals, Cemeteries, Sanitary Spaces etc) 2. Living (Homes, Workspaces, Apartments, Public Spaces, Hotels etc)

Submission Requirements I. Material containing 3-10 images /drawings /renders / collages / animation II. Text describing the concept  (500 words) I + II will be evaluated by the jury.

III. 1 video narrative (2-3 minutes) of the authors explaining their concept in black and white   Questions to be answered in the video: - Describe us your scenario/concept. - Which questions does your proposal address? - What Can Architecture Do for our Health? - What role must and should have the architects facing public health emergencies? The deliverables can only be submitted in digital files. 

Criteria The evaluation of entries will be based on the following criteria:

•  Innovation, originality, creativity of the proposal
• General impression and clarity of the overall concept 

Prizes To be announced 

Schedule Lauch:  March 16 Registration Deadline : May 20 Send at submitarticle@archisearch.gr a .doc file containing an 8-digit code + the names and contact details of the participants (name, email, telephone, country). The registration is free. Submission Deadline: May 30 Send your files with a wetransfer/dropbox/google drive link at submitarticle@archisearch.gr. The files should be only named after the 8-digit team code and should be anonymous.

Jury

LYDIA KALLIPOLITI, New York, USA

Lydia Kallipoliti is an architect, engineer and scholar whose research focuses on the intersections of architecture, technology and environmental politics. Prior to Cooper Union, she was an Assistant Professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, where she directed the MSArch program and Syracuse University; she also taught at Columbia University, Pratt Institute and the Cooper Union.

Kallipoliti is the author of the book The Architecture of Closed Worlds, Or, What is the Power of Shit (Lars Muller, 2018), as well as the History of Ecological Design for Oxford English Encyclopedia of Environmental Science. Her work has been exhibited in a number of international venues including the Venice Biennial, the Istanbul Design Biennial, the Shenzhen Biennial, the Oslo Trienalle, the London Design Museum and the Storefront for Art and Architecture. Kallipoliti is the recipient of a Webby Award, grants from the Graham Foundation, and the New York State Council for the Arts, an Honorable Mention at the Shenzhen Biennial, a Fulbright scholarship, and the ACSA annual award for Creative Achievement. Recently, her practice ANAcycle was recognized as a Leading Innovator in Sustainable Design in BUILD’s 2019 Design & Build Awards, while her book was a finalist among all publications in design, art and architecture in 2018 for the Cornish Family Prize by the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne. Kallipoliti holds a Diploma in Architecture and Engineering from AUTh in Greece, a SMArchS from MIT and a PhD from Princeton University.

ORA ITO, Paris, France

A phenomenon in pop culture, he is the youngest designer of his generation to collaborate with jewels of luxury goods and industry, after the huge multi-acclaimed success of his aluminium Heineken bottle. Cassina, Cappellini, Bouygues, Alstom, Laguiole, Zanotta and Accor highly rate his sculptural design that has become a mark of modernity. The multidisciplinary, transversal Ora ïto studio has since gone from telephone to architecture, from furniture to the hotel industry, from perfume to tramways and from flying saucers to restaurants, manipulating symbols to simplify them. A tenacious methodology for which he has invented a neologism: simplexity, decoding today’s DNA to conceptualise future mutations. His fluid vocabulary materialises movement reinventing streamlining in the digital era and giving shape to the desires of our contemporary society.

 

ROBERTO PALOMBA, Milan, Italy - Palomba Serafini Associati

Roberto and Ludovica Palomba, architects and designers, founded Palomba Serafini Associati in 1994 in Milan. Their distinctive hallmark has emerged from the capacity to combine a contemporary vision of society and user needs, with an extensive knowledge of the historical and cultural roots of design, producing results that blend the past with the future. This unique and personal approach makes them particularly sensitive to issues about function and the need to create long-lasting products.

SOPHIA VYZOVITI,  Greece

Architect, researcher and educator. Associate Professor in Architectural Design at the Department of Architecture, University of Thessaly.

Author of books ‘μικροκατοικια’ (2017) ‘soft shells’ (2011) ‘supersurfaces’ (2006) and ‘folding architecture’ (2003)

In her practice, Sophia sustains a research by design approach. In addition to architecture and urban design projects she produces architectural prototypes and temporary installations. Her goal is to enhance collective creativity within a critical spatial practice.

TOM LINDBLOM, London, UK   - Gensler

Tom is a Lifestyle Sector leader for Gensler’s Latin American region.  As a hospitality leader for the design firm, he transitioned full-time to Gensler’s Costa Rica office from the London office to support the dynamic tourism market in LATAM.   He has more than 25 years of experience on a variety of projects, with a special focus on hotels, resorts, mixed-use and museums. Working with diverse clients in Latin America, Europe, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and the United States has broadened his understanding and appreciation for unique opportunities in a variety of markets. Tom is active with clients to develop sustainable hotels and resorts that operate efficiently from an economic, social and environmental position. His experience also includes design and planning for several museums and galleries in the United States and Europe. Tom holds a Masters of Architecture degree from the University of Utah and an undergraduate degree in the History of Science and Technology from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts.

“We have waited long enough! (...) Put Theory and Practice together for real solutions and new directions. We can’t wait until 2030 or 2050.” — Tom Lindblom, Gensler UK, jury

Marianthi Tatari, Amsterdam, The Netherlands  - UN Studio

Marianthi Tatari is a Senior Architect / Associate at UNStudio. She graduated from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki where she studied architectural engineering, and received her Master of Architecture from the Southern California Institute of Architecture in Los Angeles. She joined UNStudio in 2007. She is currently responsible for the Architectural Branding design for the project of the Metro Network in Doha, Qatar.

Marianthi organizes the project team and defines design input and strategies, whilst managing contact with external relations in balance with internal project coordination. She has extensive experience with projects of varying scales and typologies. In addition to large mixed-use developments in Asia, she has also played a key role in the design of the Collector’s Loft in New York and Galleria Centercity in South Korea. Her area of focus is design, organization and bridging strong ideas with new methods of design implementation.

Kyriakos Chatziparaskevas, London, UK - Heatherwick Studio 

Kyriakos Chatziparaskevas works at Heatherwick Studio since 2014. His current work at the studio involves carrying through the construction of Google’s innovative new HQ in California. Kyriakos’ work has earned him international experience from concept to completion in a wide variety of prestigious projects that include objects, art installations, buildings, public spaces and urban infrastructure. He has worked with corporate clients, as well as with various cities and institutions. His keen interest in polymathy, encompassing design at the intersection of art, architecture, engineering and science, contributes to his experience in practising across different disciplines and implementing it on a variety of Research and Development projects.Alongside practicing architecture, Kyriakos has lectured and presented his work at various universities, institutions and events. Kyriakos holds a Diploma in Architecture and Engineering from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece, and a MA in Advanced Architectural Design from the Staedelschule in Frankfurt, Germany.