Friday, February 10, 2006

Your Hidden City: Open Source Architecture Contest

Hey architecture observers, fellow urbanologists and cityfolk! Today I have a fun announcement: Tropolism is launching the first open source architectural contest. Tropolism is an architecture blog run by Chad Smith, who has distinguished himself as a serious up-and-coming architect (he’s been involved with such projects as the public plaza at 55 Water Street, as well as designed Kate Spade retail spaces, a Chelsea art gallery, a gym and more). Tropolism and six other bloggers (including me) will jury the contest. Details of Tropolism’s vision for Your Hidden City are below:

After a week of very subtle buildup, Tropolism is pleased to announce the first open-sourced architectural contest, Your Hidden City.

The contest is simple: post your photos (with a caption) to our public Flickr pool (or email them to us), and our jury will select their favorites in five categories. The winners will be posted to Tropolism.

The theme of the contest is uncovering the Hidden City, your Hidden City, the one you see every day. It may be in plain sight of everyone else, but it is your eye that finds the extraordinariness in a particular street corner, a unique stair, a crazy intersection, a visually arresting approach, or a particular tree in the city. The photographs can be of a beautiful (and perhaps unpublished) building, or as simple as the sun hitting a particular building at a particular time of day. They should have one thing in common: They demonstrate, to you, the pleasure of living in the city.

The jury is a set of bloggers who write about architecture, urbanism, and landscape design. They are:

The 5 Categories are:

Best Hidden Place
Best Density
Best Natural/Urban Overlap
Best Vantage Point
Best Building

We will keep the contest open until March 10, 2006, and post winners the week of March 20. Good Luck!

Coincidentally, the very next post on my blog is a good example of what this contest is about:

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