The FormShift competition has been finally formally announced via the Tyee. Blurb:
The City of Vancouver has developed Climate Change Action Plans as well as the EcoDensity Charter – policies and principles to guide greener and denser development, improve building performance, reduce carbon emissions, and improve the city’s overall livability. Vancouver was the first city in Canada to adopt The 2030_Challenge for green house gas reduction, committing each of us to reducing our collective environmental impact. Vancouver City Council has taken that commitment a step further with the stated goal of becoming “the greenest city in the world”.
FormShift Vancouver challenges you to give shape to these goals through ideas and design solutions that will help shape the future of the city. Be it by expanding upon Vancouver's traditional design solutions or offering an entirely new perspective, this is your chance to build a hypothetical neighbourhood of the future, one that is in keeping with the vibrant, ecologically-friendly and sustainable city to which we aspire.
It is an open international ideas competition. There are three design categories - Vancouver Primary(purse = $6000), Vancouver Secondary($4000), and Wild Card($2000) - visit the competition website to read the category descriptions in the original bureaucrat-ese and architectural framese.
Registration deadline is March 13th.
Submission deadline is April 3rd.
It is quite unfortunate really that such a substantial competition has such a short schedule, especially, as it seems to be biting roughly on the heels of the deadline for Where's the Square?'s , which has a very civil and measured time line, filled with events and public talks, like that one happening this evening with Scot Hein. Of course, the deadline for Where's the Square? is on March 20th. It seems strange that so little time is given - just enough to make pretty pictures or to give it a good think-over, but both? Rushed. Although this economic climate is great for it - who would not want the purse? - it seems that those with stress-filled jobs/well-rounded interests will likely pass it up. Here is what the Tyee has on that:
The lull offers time to focus for idle architects and designers and other creative minds [indreamcity: really? (pauses to think of anyone who's without projects or job and is idle; comes up with no one) ] . In architectural circles it's known as a "recession renaissance." Some of the best ideas and small projects happen during busts, not booms.
And then there is that $100 dollar entry fee ($50 dollars for students and interns). Hmm... This economic climate again... Perhaps many companies will enter, if not that many individuals
However, bottom line - it is a great opportunity to come up with great ideas that will be noticed. Speaking of the jury, they are: Stan Douglas, Ian Chodikoff, David Miller, Nancy Knight, Brent Toderian.
Good luck!