Archiprix 2011

CALL FOR ENTRIES
ARCHIPRIX INTERNATIONAL 2011

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.

MIT CAMBRIDGE USA 2011
After successful editions in 2001 in Rotterdam, 2003 in Istanbul, 2005 in Glasgow, 2007 in Shanghai and 2009 in Montevideo, Archiprix International 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.

ARCHITECTURE AFTER THE GLOBAL ICONS
An International design competition inevitably raises questions of how we define global criticality. Archiprix has invited MIT and the Platform for Permanent Modernity to engage in a critical conversation about architectural practice in its totality. Is there a future for a critical global architecture project, now that our eyes have already tired of countless global icons, every monument glitzier than every previous one? Is ‘critical regionalism’ the alternative to the proliferation of global icons? Or has regional difference already been eroded to the point where resuscitating it is a matter of nostalgia? And if so, how do we deal with the rising global mutiny against globalization? Is the age after the icons one of a new muteness? Archiprix and MIT create an enormous experiment towards the possibility of defining what constitutes ‘criticality’ in architecture on a truly international scale.

HUNTER DOUGLAS AWARDS
The best projects, selected by an international jury will receive the Hunter Douglas Awards, during a special awards ceremony. The awards carry the name of our partner Hunter Douglas, producer of well known brands like Luxaflex and Luxalon. The awards ceremony is accompanied by a conference, a series of presentations of participating projects, and an exhibition. The designers of the best graduation projects can participate in an international design workshop the week before the award ceremony.

WEB PRESENTATIONS
The Archiprix website will display a growing web presentation of the submitted projects. This website also contains a presentation of the projects submitted for the 2001, 2003, 2005, 2007 and 2009 editions and the world’s largest database of universities and colleges teaching architecture, urban design and landscape architecture. For more details and the latest news please visit the official website at www.archiprix.org or the MIT host website at mit.edu/archiprix.