GRAPHISOFT sponsors inaugural ArchiCAD Student Design Competition

Graphisoft North America, the makers of ArchiCAD 19, has partnered with noted ArchiCAD firm, Kitchen & Associates (K&A) and AIA West Jersey, to offer an exciting student design competition, coinciding with this year’s AIA 2016 Convention in Philadelphia, 19-21 May 2016.

The Challenge

As this year’s AIA host city, Philadelphia continues its tradition of serving as a colorful backdrop to dozens of concerts, conventions, sporting events and festivals annually. Currently, the city lacks temporary mobile visitor centers that can be brought to those venues and welcome event attendees.

The challenge, open to all current US-based architectural and interior design students (graduate and undergraduate) provides entrants an opportunity to position Philadelphia’s rich history in front of the millions of tourists who visit it annually by using ARCHICAD to design temporary, mobile visitor centers from shipping containers.

01 – New 2016 Spring Student Design Competition sponsored by Graphisoft.

“Given our long-standing connection with and support of students at the university level, we are very excited to sponsor this competition,” said Steve Benford, Managing Director, at GRAPHISOFT North America. “Knowing how ARCHICAD fuels design freedom, we expect to see creative entries that really push the envelope.”

Entries will be held to certain criteria including but not limited to: how well the project responds to its site, how well the model communicates functionality of the visitor’s center, etc.  Students will also be judged on how well they used the software elements to create a site plan, elevations and sections.

Designs will be evaluated by a board of judges made up of GRAPHISOFT staff, AIA West Jersey board members, and professionals from K&A as well as professors from local universities.

“As the professional architectural community descends on the greater Philadelphia area during the AIA convention, we can think of no better time for a student competition such as this,” said Jason Lutz, AIA, President of AIA West Jersey. “We are thrilled to support such a unique design challenge that asks students to create transient places within a diverse permanent architectural fabric, and to convey it all via a superior BIM platform like ARCHICAD — let’s just say we are highly anticipating the work of our future Architects.”

GRAPHISOFT has assembled an esteemed panel of judges to evaluate the submissions. By entering the contest, entrants will have their problem-solving, design and technical skills reviewed by firm principals who are actively seeking new talent.

“College graduates who come to the job market with ARCHICAD skills are in high demand,” explained Stephen Schoch, Managing Principal at K&A. “Firms who rely on ARCHICAD seek out these individuals because they bring high value to an existing workflow.”

A total of $3,000 in cash prizes will be awarded to entrants who are judged to have designed the best mobile visitor center. Winners will be announced at a special event during the AIA Convention hosted by competition co-host – noted ARCHICAD firm, Kitchen & Associates.

For more information and to enter, the official student design competition website can be found at http://competition.graphisoftus.com/.

To learn more about ArchiCAD and Graphisoft go here.

About Kitchen & Associates

With over four decades of design experience and a professional staff selected from a variety of disciplines, Kitchen & Associates provides world-class architecture, engineering, planning, interior design and energy-related consulting services to non-profit organizations, private developers, local municipalities and public agencies throughout the country.

About AIA West New Jersey

Founded in 1857, the American Institute of Architects (AIA) is the professional organization that helps architects serve the public’s needs and builds awareness of the role of architects and architecture in American society. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., its 300 plus local chapters represent 87,000 licensed architects and allied professionals. The AIA West Jersey section, formed in 1925, was created to help support local AIA member architects throughout Burlington, Camden, Gloucester and Salem Counties. AIA West Jersey offers its members a variety of programs, continuing education seminars, community outreach, and advocacy, so that the individual members and architectural firms of AIA West Jersey can be of ever increasing service to their local communities. For more information, please visit aiawestjersey.org.