Vision Dallas: Off to San Francisco

The Re:Vision Dallas design competition has closed. Ninety-five entries were received and I’m leaving Sunday to be in San Francisco Monday and Tuesday to observe the competition jury at work. I am excited beyond words. I will get to spend two days seeing the work of brilliant architects and designers critiqued by five brilliant and learned judges. I expect to learn more about sustainable design in those two days than I could in years of studying on my own.

The judges for the competition are so distinguished and accomplished that I can only briefly summarize who they are:

Aidan Hughes leads the North American planning practice for Arup, a global firm that has done buildings, consulting and infrastructure in at least 68 countries, on every continent but Antarctica. Just a glance through its portfolio will show you everything from shopping malls in Borneo, to pedestrian bridges in Italy, to a subway station in New York. You can see a selection of their projects here: http://www.arup.com/arup/projects.cfm.

Cameron Sinclair is the Executive Director of Architecture for Humanity and co-author of Design Like You Give A Damn. Among other honors, his efforts to find architectural solutions to humanitarian needs has led the World Economic Forum to name him as a Young Global Leader. You can see more about the work of Architecture for Humanity here: http://www.architectureforhumanity.org/.

Eric Corey Freed is a principal at organicARCHITECT and the author of Green Building and Architecture for Dummies. organicARCHITECT is considered a leader in the field; named by San Francisco Magazine "Best Green Architect" in 2005 and "Best Visionary" in 2007; and "Green Visionary" by 7x7 Magazine in 2008. You can see the online journal, Ecotecture, which Eric helped found here: http://www.ecotecture.com/.

Pliny Fisk is one of two Texans on the panel. He co-founded the Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems in 1975, and currently serves as Co-Director. The Center is recognized as the oldest architecture and planning 501C3 non-profit in the U.S. focused on sustainable design. In addition, Pliny also serves as a Fellow in Sustainable Urbanism and a Fellow in Health Systems Design at Texas A & M University where he holds a joint position as signature faculty in Architecture, Landscape Architecture and Planning. Professor Fisk’s researches on methods and materials for green building have been ground breaking.

Sergio Palleroni is the second Texan on the panel. He is a research fellow at the Center for Sustainable Development at the University of Texas. He has worked on housing and community development in the developing world since the 1970's, both for not-for-profit, governmental and international development and relief agencies such as the United Nations as well as the governments of Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Nicaragua, India and Tunisia. He has received numerous awards for his teaching and design work for underserved communities, including the National Design Award from the Smithsonian Institution and the White House Millenium Project in 2005. His books include: Time & Other Constructs: The Work of Carlos Miijares, co-authored with Rodolfo Santamaria; Studio at Large; Architecture in Service of Global Communities, with Christine Merkelbach; and Teaching Sustainability in Asia.

I look forward to watching the judging and trying to learn just a little bit about how the jury panel thinks; how the judges distinguish good design from better design; and how the panel comes to a decision about the winners and runners up.

I’ll try to keep the blog up to date so you can see my thoughts on the process.