University at Buffalo's international competition seeks to rethink resilient design

The University at Buffalo School of Architecture and Planning is kicking off an international design competition that challenges architects, landscape architects and those in related fields to rethink the way buildings and landscapes are designed to be more resilient to the impacts of climate change.

Called The Resilient Campus, the challenge will comprise the design competition, as well as a traveling exhibition, public event and a publication documenting the work. Indicative of the school’s “Buffalo as a laboratory” approach to architecture, design and planning, The Resilient Campus will leverage UB’s South Campus — an urban campus on its way to becoming carbon-neutral — as its centerpiece.

Up to seven teams will be participating. Three globally renowned architecture and landscape architecture firms from Europe, Asia, and the U.S. with proven expertise in resilience have been pre-invited to the competition’s second stage. The teams are MVRDV + RIOS, STOSS Landscape Urbanism + Höweler Yoon Architecture; and Turenscape Landscape Architecture + CannonDesign.

In addition, the school issued a request for qualifications inviting other designers to submit relevant past projects to be reviewed by a committee that will select up to four more teams to advance to the next stage of the competition.

UB faculty will lead student groups that will have the opportunity to interact with the participating teams when they come to campus and Buffalo in October for a site visit, an amazing opportunity for UB students to learn from outstanding mentors in their fields.

“The impacts of climate change and its attendant crises are reshaping the way we design, inhabit and sustain our built environment and the living landscape systems that support it,” says Julia Czerniak, dean of the UB School of Architecture and Planning and The Resilient Campus creator. “We must think beyond our current approaches and conventions to move from best to next practices in our fields that will advance diverse and integrated strategies across all scales of the built and living environment.”

The competition focuses on two scales: campus and building. At the campus scale, teams will develop and apply strategies for an ecologically robust, resilient landscape for UB’s South Campus. In the building scale, teams will develop and apply an adaptive strategy for a portion of the existing Health Sciences Complex and a schematic approach to a University-Assisted Public School.

“Through this challenge, we hope to shift some of the thinking about designing and planning for resilience,” Czerniak adds. “We are attempting to approach this problem more strategically based on what might happen in the future by designing scenarios, not fixed plans. For example, what happens if we start to have 10 days above 100 degrees in the summer? How do we provide amenities for the campus community? Or, paradoxically, when intense snow falls in shorter periods, how do we rethink approaching the landscape and the maintenance of our campuses and the performance of our buildings?”

Once all the teams have been selected, they will move on to the second stage of the competition, where they will receive the competition brief. A jury of design and allied professionals, city representatives and university administrators will review and critique each entry, ultimately awarding first, second and third place. The winning team will receive $50,000.

Each team must include an architect and a landscape architect, and may include individuals from related fields, such as planners, engineers, ecologists, lighting designers and graphic designers. Additional information is available via https://archplan.buffalo.edu/the-resilient-campus.

The disciplinary knowledge generated by The Resilient Campus will be on display through a traveling exhibition, examined through a symposium, and disseminated through a book.

The project is being funded by the School of Architecture and Planning, with assistance provided by University at Buffalo’s Graduate School of Education, School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Office of Sustainability, University Facilities, and Campus Planning, Design, and Construction.