International Architecture Thesis Awards 2014
After the huge success of International Architecture Awards 2013 (IATA2013), This year, RTF is launching the IATA 2014. The IATA are the absolute global architectural award event for the recent graduates with 15 categories and 10 esteemed judges across the globe. It’s your chance to be distinguished around the best in the profession.

525 registrations from more than 60 countries.

See previous Winners

Designed to develop an architectural language that would ‘sustain’ and ‘survive’ the impacts of new age challenges, and evolve into an architectural language of the future – taking sustainability one step ahead. The IATA 2014 will carry extraordinary eminence to your work. 

Three winners in each Category.

Also depending on the Jury’s Decision, Some projects will receive Honorable Mentions. Last year there were about 5-6 Honorable Mentions in each Category. Those projects are then will be compiled in a book ‘IATA 2014’, which will be given to every participant of the ‘International Architecture Thesis Awards 2014′. The book will also be available online for the people worldwide.

First Award-Residential / Housing

Project Name:(Re)Interpretations of Nature

Designed By:Nathan Fisher

University:Lawrence Technological University

Country:Canada

This thesis seeks to define a new cultural meaning of nature within the urban environment where a symbiotic relationship with urbanism is sought through the facilitation of architecture. Cultural views on nature have changed drastically in the past; conquering nature was a pre-industrial view and post-industrial views perceived nature as untouchable and in need of preservation. However, humankind has consistently been seen as existing outside of nature. Perhaps nature needs to be modernized and (re)interpreted as an essential system to contemporary urbanism.

This concept is tested on the Lower Don Lands, a waterfront site along the east end of Toronto, Canada, where edge conditions play a significant role. Lake Ontario is understood as the natural edge and the encroaching development of the city comprises the urban edge and the space between marks the grounds for exploration. Historically, the site was a former natural wetland where the Don River drained into Lake Ontario; since then the river has been re-routed to improve shipping; presently the site is abandoned and contaminated, with an eroded shipping wall and polluted shoreline. This condition is unfortunately typical for most post-industrial cities. However, is it possible to (re)interpret cultural ideas on nature within the local conditions of the site through the medium of ecology and infrastructure to begin to establish a healthy symbiotic relationship with urbanism?

The strategy began with an exploration of suitable forms to respond to the nature and context of the site as well as an evaluation of existing urbanism through conventional building typologies and zoning ordinances. Manipulating the conventional Toronto high-rise residential podium and point tower typology to respond to the natural features of the site while also maintaining a high level of expected density was the result. It was discovered that more density actually contributed to more open space, creating an interdependent relationship. This new urban outdoor space serves as a hub that networks the urban inhabitant with the process of the city by promoting a temporal dimension that allows for the exploration of new ideas in urban living through dynamic public spaces. To create these dynamic public spaces, a malleable nature is necessary.

Ecology and infrastructure are critical to a contemporary definition of nature. The project explores ecological efforts that (re)interpret the engineered mouth of the Don River, and the shipping wall into several evolving eco-parks linked with the architectural development of the site that focus on the overall improvement of the de-generative state. New infrastructure is integrated into the architecture derived from the form study in a network of pathways, streets and open spaces creating a three-dimensional surface that promotes community interaction and a thriving neighborhood through a (re)interpretation of nature.

First Award,Mixed Use

Project Name:Urban Paradox

Designed By:Chun Shing Tsui

University:The University of Hong Kong

Country:Hong Kong

Urban Paradox Architectural Iteration to Paranoiac Tensions

From the study of the Cold War Fallout shelters and terrorist attack at 9-11, there is a cyclical relationship between architecture and paranoia. The Cold War fallout shelter is brought by the anxiety towards nuclear war which demonstrated a sense of paranoia which leads to the creation of a new definition of architecture, called Bunker Architecture. While, 9-11 illustrated the destruction of architecture can create a new set of paranoia. And this sense of paranoia could feed back to the creation of architecture again, and even lead to another level of paranoia. So, the architectural iteration on construction and destruction could create paranoia, and also applicable vice versa. In conclusion, the tension between paranoia and architecture is not only a one-way relationship, but a looping and cyclical relationship.

The site for the project is the largest abandoned factory at Detroit of the US. It has certain anxiety, conflict of interest which provides a testing ground to explore the potential of architecture, through construction and demolition, in response to the existing paranoia tension between stakeholders and even lead to certain impact on the creation of paranoia. Instead of thinking the Packard Plant as a sick, dangerous and unsightly decaying mega structures, my project tries to rethink and celebrate the destruction process as inverted construction, so its paranoiac nature is converted to be creative and inclusive.

My project seeks to depict these national and domestic conflicts and turn it into potential for new architecture to re-inhabit the site responding to the paranoiac situations in phases.

To respond to the paranoiac tensions between the city and the scrappers, the first architecture introduced to the site is a construction waste recycling plant which formalized the scrapping industry by centralizing the material treatment process within a mega block. Existing Packard Plant would endure the risk of change when more and more scrappers coming to the site, in different forms of re-occupation. Due to the influx of Chinese capital on car industry in Detroit, the centralized scrap metal treatment allures the GM Motor to set up a new headquarter, financially supported by the Chinese car companies. The new car assembly line is built by demolishing the existing tallest building in the site. These 2 parties, both mutually beneficial and competitive, create a hidden dialogue in the possession of the site, material exchange and manpower competition. With more and more stakeholders concerned, the paranoiac tensions become convoluted and bring questions to the role of historical buildings changes and the role of new architecture performs in paranoiac tensions so that construction and destruction can achieve to sustain an equilibrium.

On a city level, it could be imagined the recycling plant becomes a system to facilitate the destruction of the abandoned structures of the city and providing new materials and incentives for re-construction which is actually carried on by the new car manufacturing plant and it further performs as a role of reconstructing the city by reoccupying vacant lot and taking control of the land again. Detroit, once the world’s traditional automotive center, its emerge and collapse were both brought by the car manufactory industry. Its rebirth would be paradoxically led by the automobile industry again, but with Chinese capital supported behind.

First Award Public / Institutional

Project Name:Center for Musical Experimentation

Designed By:Victor Diaz Ortega

University:Universidad Europea de Madrid

Country:Spain

Throughout history we have seen how music, like the other arts, is influenced by the context.

The blues has its roots in the “spiritual songs” of African American workers in the late eighteenth and electronic music emerged thanks to the invention of the synthesizer in 1970. So the music styles were born thanks to a specific context, in this case a social and technological context.
The architectural context is very important. The spaces influence the musician when composing. Due to various acoustic phenomenons, the music does not sound the same inside different buildings.

African traditional music is very percussive and rhythmic, without harmony and simple melodies. On the other hand, in Europe music tended more toward melodies with longer notes and softer rhythms. While in Africa they played in open spaces, in Europe the music was played in great Gothic cathedrals where there was much reverberation, it sounds enriched and prolonged but the changes were limited. We can realise that there is a clear relationship between the space and the music played on it.

After this reflection, design intentions emerge:
If the spatial characteristics influence the music, then it has to be created spaces with the richest acoustic possible. Very different spaces where the music sounds completely different, thus promoting the variety of styles. When generating these spaces, the musician can experiment with all kind of styles and instruments in each space. Experimentation becomes a need to create music.

Moreover, the process to enter this state of “Dionysian inspiration” is unknown, it is probably something so personal that you can not create a situation common to everybody. But what can be done is a place that facilitates the search for references, create a brainstorming space. Encouraging social interaction and the exchange can generate a place of learning, where the musician is constantly influenced by the music played around.
We are what we hear, our tastes are created by our environment. So with more variety around, more personal and independent is the style of the musician.

Project Intention
– Encourage involvement and exchange of ideas between musicians
– Encourage musical experimentation.

To accomplish this, we work with four different acoustic phenomena: the reverberation, the echo, the resonance and the “random harmony”.
Resonance chambers are created from the study of the relationship between frequency and geometry. Allowing the sound exiting those chambers, harmonies will be randomly created. The people will walk through the building, listening to a mix of melodies totally different.
The building will have a perimeter of school program, but inside, an oniric world will take place. A world where the music is constantly transforming, changing and evolving.

First Award -Sustainable Design

Project Name:Urban Renewal

Designed By:Riccardo Torresi

University:University of Ferrara