The AIANY COTE Awards will further sustainable design in the architectural profession, make transparent the lessons learned, and reveal the process behind real innovation in an urban context.

Our design community demands proof that truly sustainable buildings meet the standard of both Beauty and Performance. The competition will promote greater understanding of design strategies through transparency, comparative operational data, and compelling lessons learned that reveal and inspire new materials, technologies and design solutions. In order to nourish the design community, entrants are asked to reveal the direct impacts of their projects, share the tools developed along the way, engage in the redefinition of value, and illustrate challenges overcome during the process of design and construction.

The success of design is often judged on the basis of a photograph or drawing, the innovation of a connection detail or the elegance of a perfectly conceived volume. These will always be critical elements of our craft. But as architects we are trained to work within and for a greater context and larger purpose. Climate change, political stability, energy and water independence, under-funded urban infrastructure, and environmental impacts to individual health are all now part of the design conversation and part of our responsibility. These challenges present new opportunities to enrich the profession — to create a positive impact on the world we build in. Truly beautiful creation is built from just this type of substantive calibration; problem solving without new problem making. In the proof of our impact there lies something truly beautiful.

“When I am working on a problem, I never think about beauty but when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong.”

— R. Buckminster Fuller

Awards Schedule

Deadline

All submissions must be received by 5:00 p.m. (EST) on Friday November 10th, 2014. The submission deadline will be strictly observed; no exceptions will be made. Winners will be announced at the Center for Architecture at 6:30pm on Wednesday December 10th, 2014. Winners will be asked to participate in a presentation at the Center for Architecture on Thursday, December 18th, 2014.

Eligibility

All projects must be located within a radius of 100 miles from Central Park, Manhattan, NYC. All architects licensed in the U.S. are invited to submit their completed built projects, regardless of project size, budget, style, or building type. Entries are welcome and encouraged from both established and new practitioners and designers, and from firms of all sizes.

Completed new buildings, renovations / restorations, and interior architecture are eligible.

Projects must be built and completed after Jan 1st, 2009 and for at least three months prior to the submission deadline. “Completion” is synonymous with “substantial completion,” as defined in the standard AIA documents governing construction.  It is strongly encouraged that projects include a minimum of one (1) year of operational performance data (energy and water.)

The entry is to be submitted by the architect (Design Architect or Architect of Record.)

The submitting architect may qualify as a member of a design team, whether or not serving as the head of the team. When one architect is not the sole author, all other participants contributing substantially to the design of the project must be given credit as part of the submission, regardless of professional discipline. Project authorship must remain anonymous during jury deliberations. If authorship is revealed on any submission materials – images, plans, or narrative – the entry will be disqualified. A project that credits any 2014 AIANY COTE AWARDS jury member or his/her firm as architect, associate architect, consultant, or client is ineligible and will be disqualified if submitted.

Entries from firms that have signed onto the AIA 2030 Commitment will be favorably weighted in the judging. Firms can sign onto the AIA 2030 Commitment via the following link.

> via aian?ycoteawards.org