"From the Ground Up: Innovative Green Homes" Picks Finalists

Syracuse Architecture Announces Finalists for Affordable Green Housing Design Competition

Syracuse University School of Architecture, in partnership with the Syracuse Center of Excellence in Environment and Energy Systems and Home HeadQuarters, Inc., has announced the finalists for “From the Ground Up: Innovative Green Homes.” The goals of the competition are to foster the most advanced thinking about design, sustainability, and cost-effective building practices for an affordable single family house.

Multi-disciplinary teams that include an architect, structural engineer, sustainability expert, and landscape architect were encouraged to apply. The three winning teams are:

• do-it-together.org (including BriggsKnowles A+D, THEM (Lynch+Crembil), Derek Porter Studio, Studio Lisa Maione, Leonard Newcomb Landscape Architecture, and Thomas Young Associates); New York City and Kansas City
• Erdy McHenry Architecture, Stenson-Building + Furniture Design, AKF Engineers, and Siteworks; Philadelphia, Syracuse, and Charlottesville
• Onion Flats, (including Andropogon Associates, Rivera Structural Design, and MaGrann Associates); Philadelphia

Three alternate teams were also selected in the event that a team is unexpectedly unable to compete. They are:

• BILD Design, Meffert + Ethridge Environmental Projects, and Pierre Stouse;
• BLDGS, The Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems, D.I.R.T. Studio, and Palmer Engineering;
• Leroy Street Studio Architecture, Hester Street Collaborative, Terra Firma, Buro Happold Consulting Engineers, Reed Hildebrand Associates, and John Wagner.

“The winning teams were selected from an exceptionally competitive pool of entries with a high number of truly outstanding submissions from very well respected practices,” said Julia Czerniak, the director of UPSTATE: at the Syracuse University School of Architecture and a member of the selection jury. “We anticipate design approaches that will yield built work contributing to the revitalization of communities here and in rust-belt cities across the nation.”

These three teams will join the four pre-selected teams listed below in developing designs for a site on Syracuse’s Near Westside, one of the first residential neighborhoods in the city that is now facing significant economic, social, and environmental challenges.

The teams will visit the Syracuse site in mid-October and submit their design proposals after the eight-week second stage of the competition ending in mid-December. A jury will then select up to three winning designs in January 2009 to coincide with a symposium and exhibition of the finalists’ submissions at the School of Architecture.. Construction of the prototypes by Home HeadQuarters is expected to begin in fall 2009.

The four pre-selected teams include:

• Adjaye / Associates, London and New York
• Cook + Fox / Terrapin Bright Green, New York and Washington DC
• Della Valle Bernheimer and ARO, New York
• Office dA and Architecture Studio himma, Boston and Seoul

The jury includes: Barry Bergdoll/The Philip Johnson Chief Curator of Architecture and Design, The Museum of Modern Art; Edward Bogucz/Executive Director, Syracuse Center of Excellence in Environmental Systems, Syracuse University; Julia Czerniak/Director, UPSTATE: A Center for Design, Research, and Real Estate, Syracuse University School of Architecture; Julie Eizenberg/Principal, Koning Eizenberg Architecture; Bethaida González/President, Syracuse Common Council; Marilyn Higgins/Vice President, Community Engagement & Economic Development, Syracuse University; Carol Horan/Near Westside Resident; David Lewis/Principal, Lewis.Tsurumaki.Lewis; Jason Pearson/President and CEO, GreenBlue; Kerry Quaglia/Executive Director, Home HeadQuarters; Mark Robbins/Dean, Syracuse University School of Architecture.

“From the Ground Up” is a project of UPSTATE: A Center for Design, Research, and Real Estate created in 2005 as a resource for the city, campus, and region to address critical issues of urban revitalization in the city of Syracuse, Upstate New York, and other regions of disinvestment nationally.

The Central New York Community Foundation and the Community Preservation Corporation have provided additional support for this competition. For more information on the competition, please visit soa.syr.edu/competition.