Competitions
The AIAS supports and sponsors design competitions to contribute to the education of all students. Competitions present unique opportunities to investigate and utilize building materials and design techniques from different perspectives or those that the student might not be familiar with already. Furthermore, participants compete among students from a broad range of programs and are evaluated by diverse juries of experts. Competitions can also assist instructors with developing a repertoire of design challenges to use in studio courses.
Since the 1970’s, the sponsors have included: AARP, American Galvanizers Association, American Institute of Steel Construction, American Life Insurance Co., American Plastics Council, Apple, Cadkey, Copper Development Association, International Corrugated Packaging Foundation, International Masonry Institute, Graphisoft, GE, Jeld-Wen, Kawneer, Lego, McDonald’s, Modular Building Institute, National Endowment for the Arts, National Science Foundation, National Roofing Contractors Association, Sheet Metal Workers, Trespa, US Information Agency, and the Vinyl Institute.
AIAS/AGA Ascension Competition!
Every year United States veterans return home with injury; in fact, roughly 26% of our veterans live with some kind of disability from the service they gave to our country. Many return home with loss of mobility (bullet wound, loss of limbs, etc) that drastically changes the way they interact with the world and sometimes even the loss of the very freedoms they defended. This is not what our veterans deserve and this is why the American Institute of Architecture Students and the American Galvanizers Association have teamed to help offer freedom back to veterans by presenting the Design Competition, Ascension.
Ascension asks students form around the globe to explore ways of ascending for those who must now continue to fight just to enter their home.
This competition asks participants to create an adaptable, lightweight wheelchair ramp for injured veterans utilizing galvanized steel that will give injured veterans the freedom to come home.
The winning design will be produced and implemented throughout the country for deserving veterans and make a difference in the lives and communities of those who served our country. Competition entries will need to stretch common thinking to create a ramp with interchangeable parts that can be adapted and used in many different home configurations. The possiblities are endless but the chance to enter your own home with dignity should be for everyone and something we all fight for each day.
Register for the webinar here!
AIAS and AGA will run the Galvanize It! webinar on Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 8:00 pm ET.
The webinar will assist teams designing galvanized steel ramps for the Ascension competition. The presentation will review the galvanizing process, coating characteristics, ASTM (American Society for Testing and Materials) specifications, and best design practices for high-quality products to ensure the designs submitted are realistic and able to be produced. Following the presentation, the AGA will conduct a question and answer session.
Register for the competition here!
Submission Deadline: August 30, 2013
Grand Prize: $8,000! (AIAS Chapter $1,500)
Tips for Laying Out Your Competition Boards
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Grab the Interest of the Audience: Provide a clear, succinct statement of what makes your design great. Very clear. Very succinct. Judges facing heaps of entries paw through them at a furious rate, and the brilliance may not leap to the glazed-over eye.
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Identify Your Message: Determine the purpose or main concept of your design boards. Do you want to advertise a specific element of you design? Explain how your design process came about? These key pieces of information will influence the overall design.
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Utilize the Power of Branding: Consider what important text and images you might like to include in the design boards, such as the name of project, design process, any explanations that can't be understood with images, a single large photograph or image or a series of smaller images.
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Be Clean and Concise: Narrow down your list of potential elements to a few key images and words. Design boards should contain as few elements as possible, to deliver a single message that's easy to spot from a distance.
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Make it Readable: Try resizing the text and images to emphasize and focus on the design board's most important message. Select a font for the text that is easy to read from a distance and matches the theme of your project. A general rule of thumb to follow is that your design boards should be readable from 10 feet away when projected on a 10 foot wide screen.
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Keep it Subtle: Choose a color scheme that suits the purpose and audience of the competition. Avoid using too many colors on the same design board.
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Be Creative: Experiment with different arrangements of these elements in your layout software, or print them out and arrange them on a flat surface of piece of poster board. Try overlapping elements, as well as putting them side by side or in a sequential order.
- Final Thought: Remember that your design boards have to express everything you would say to the jurors in person. Look at your design boards like a magazine article. By the last page does the reader get a full understanding of your project or are they left with questions?
