Students Compete in Virginia Society AIA Prize

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Students from Hampton University, Virginia Tech, Virginia Tech’s Washington-Alexandria Architecture Center, and the University of Virginia took part in the 32nd annual Virginia Society AIA Prize competition over the weekend of Jan. 27–30, 2012. From those submissions, each school advances 10 finalists; the winning design will be selected by a jury in February.

This year’s competition problem was developed by faculty at Hampton University and addressed our ability (or inability) to provide temporary emergency housing. Students were asked to propose a semi-permanent and reusable intervention in one of the region’s most naturally vulnerable locations — Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. The problem asked students to design one prototypical unit, not to exceed 600 square-feet, capable of housing up to 4 individuals. Designs were to include a site plan demonstrating how four of these prototypical units could be arranged to form the embryo of a community. Students were also asked to envision how these structures could be used as housing for special events during non-catastrophic times.

The Virginia Society AIA Prize — along with the accompanying $2000 check — will be awarded during the Virginia Design Forum: Skins, March 16-17, in Charlottesville, Virginia. Best of School nods (and possibly an honorable mention or two) will be noted as well. An exhibition of all of the finalists will tour each of the schools and will wrap up in the ArchEx Exhibit Hall at Architecture Exchange East on Nov. 8–9.

Member Named Among Most Admired Educators

Robert Dunay, FAIA. Image courtesy Va. Tech.
Robert Dunay, FAIA. Image courtesy Va. Tech.

Robert Dunay, FAIA, the T.A. Carter Professor of Architecture in the School of Architecture + Design at Virginia Tech, has been named one of the 25 Most Admired Educators of 2012 by the magazine DesignIntelligence.

DesignIntelligence, the only national college ranking survey focused exclusively on design, annually selects educators and education administrators who exemplify excellence in design education leadership for this distinction. The disciplines of architecture, interior design, industrial design, and landscape architecture are included.

This is the third time Dunay has received this recognition from the magazine.

Other notables include Scott Poole, who recently left Virginia and his position as director of the School of Architecture and Design at Virginia Tech to become Dean of College of Architecture and Design at the University of Tennessee; and Elizabeth Meyer, Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture at University of Virginia’s School of Architecture.

Tech’s LumenHAUS Wins AIA Honor Award

LumenHAUS, courtesy Va. Tech

Virginia Tech’s acclaimed LumenHAUS has earned another feather in its much-adorned cap. This net-zero-energy house — which has garnered attention not only for design excellence but as an educational tool — has been awarded a 2012 Institute Honor Award for Architecture from the national component of the AIA. Recognized by the Society with a 2011 VSAIA design award and the Prize for Design Research and Scholarship in 2010, the LumenHAUS also took home the top prize at the European Solar Decathlon in 2010.

The house has been on display in New York’s Times Square, Washington, D.C. and alongside Mies van der Rohe’s Farnsworth House as an exhibition, not only on good design, but as a tool informing the wider public about issues of alternative energy and sustainability.

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