Sponsors: terreform One

Type: Open, Ideas

Language: English

Eligibility: Professionals and students of all fields are eligible to submit. However, there will be two separate categories of judging: one for professionals and college students and the second for high school students.

Registration Fee:
$150 – Professional teams
$50 – per high school student team

Awards:
$10,000 – Professional Prize
$1,000 – Student Prize

Timeline:
31 March 2010 – Registration closes; Answers posted
30 April 2010: Submission Due
31 May 2010 – Finalists Announced
June 2010 – Award Ceremony and Web Symposium; Exhibition launched

Jury:
Carol Coletta
Margaret Crawford, Ph.D
Bruce Lindsey
DJ Spooky, AKA Paul D. Miller
William J. Mitchell
Margie Ruddick
Ben Schwegler, Ph.D
Cameron Sinclair + Kate Stohr

Design Challenge: The competition is launched in the context of larger issues concerning the environment, global food production and the imperative to generate a sense of community in our urban and suburban neighborhoods. From Mowing to Growing is not meant to transform each lawn into a garden, but to open us up to the possibilities of self-sustenance, organic growth, and perpetual change. In particular, it seeks specific technical, urbanistic, and architectural strategies not simply for the food production required to feed the cities and suburbs, but the possibilities of diet, agriculture, and retrofitted facilities that could achieve that level within the constraints of the local climate.

• How would you reinvent the American Lawn?
• What sort of design solutions can you come up with to facilitate ‘burb-grown food’?
• Can green houses be incorporated in skyscrapers? -How could a vacant big box store be retrofitted for agriculture?
• What is required to remove foreclosure signs dotting many lawns and convert them to community gardens?
• Can food grow on rooftops, parking lots, building facades?

Proposals shall consist of a digital design sketchbook that outlines and illustrates your proposal: core premise and objectives, inventiveness, design approach developed at a conceptual level, and opportunities for implementation.  The proposal can be for a real or speculative project, for one or more real sites, and located either in the U.S. or applicable to U.S. sites. Further, the proposal need not be generated exclusively for this competition, provided that it addresses the intent of the competition. It may be the result of earlier research or the reworking of an unrealized project.

Submission Requirements:
The submission should include both visual and textual information, with pages formatted horizontally 11” by 17”. Its length must not exceed 5 pages. The digital file, in PDF format @ 300 dpi, should not exceed 10 MB. No identifying information should be included, as entries will be presented and judged anonymously. The presence of identifying information will be grounds for automatic disqualification. To identify submissions, each applicant will receive a registration number that must appear on the first page of the proposal, upper right corner. Upon receiving registration applications, Terreform 1 will issue each registrant a registration number, which must appear on the first page of the proposal or in the upper right hand corner.

High School Student Competition:
A parallel competition offers students the opportunity to take on the challenge of From Mowing to Growing. All programmatic intent is the same in the student competition as the regular competition. Entrants to this portion of the competition, which comprises a single stage, may enter as individuals, independent teams, or through academic studios under the leadership of an instructor.
The competition organizers energetically encourage participation among students, and are willing to work with instructors who wish to set the competition problems for the Spring 2010 term. Each student (or student team) is required to submit 1 to 3 pages formatted horizontally 11” by 17” in digital form. The student or student team will be assigned a registration number to affix to the board upon receipt of registration application and fee. Up to five student submissions will be chosen to be exhibited with a cash award of $500. All selected projects will be included in the Terreform 1 web exhibition.

For more information, go to:   http://www.oneprize.org