Home For All international student design competition - Award of Excellence

The Home for All project was developed after the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake in 2011 as a means for Japanese architects to create small gathering spaces for comfort and exchange in devastated communities. Since then the project has played a similar role after the 2016 Kumamoto earthquake while evolving as a contemplation of the role of architects and architecture within society. It looks towards a mode of design where observations and propositions are not detached from civic participation, but emerge within it. The competition, whose Jury is chaired by Toyo Ito, considers this proposition alongside the role of timber structures in contemporary Japan.

Laim Patterson and Will Mulhiesen

Rekindling Ceremony

A huge congratulations to Liam Patterson and Will Muhleisen for winning the Award of Excellence at the final stage of the Home For All international student design competition! The pair of third-year BLAD students presented their work to the jury, chaired by Toyo Ito, in Tokyo over the weekend. As runners-up they received the Excellence award along with a 500,000 Yen check ($6000 AUD) and certificate of merit.

Liam and Will's entry was prepared as part of their upper-pool design studio — Pride and Prejudice — lead by Heike Rahmann. The studio considers design as a critical spatial practice that seeks to draw attention to wider social and political issues. In doing so it questions the relationship between designers and society in public projects and argues for 'an independent actor with a conscience' to navigate a multitude of conflicts and interests.