The winning teams fought off stiff competition from other finalists and were announced by special guest judge and founder of the Passive House Institute, Professor Wolfgang Feist, at Ecobuild on 2 March.
The competition required students to design a tower, encompassing Isover Multi-Comfort House principles and Passive House performance levels, to be located in the Greenwich South district of Lower Manhattan, New York. The eight shortlisted teams were invited to showcase their entries at Ecobuild, presenting their ideas to a panel of leading industry experts.
The winning entry was revealed as The Green Canyons, designed by Ankur Modi, Suruchi Modi and Chuyu Qui from the University of Nottingham. The Green Canyons was designed to reconnect the city of Manhattan and achieve a cohesive identity to counter the depleting quality of life in vertical urban sprawl. Connecting and creating communities rather than isolating occupants, the design redefines quality of life at height.
Commenting on the winning entry, the judges said they were impressed by the level of thought, detailing and research that had been put into the project to ensure it would work in reality, in a city context.
The runners up in second place were the University of Nottingham’s Yeuk Hei Wong, Xu Xu and Jianhui Chen for their entry, Social Tower Experiment. A tower which breaks through the social isolation of typical skyscrapers, the design proposes a new, vertical street lifestyle to foster vibrant communities and social interaction at height.
Finally, in third place, the judges selected The Green Ramp, submitted by Ranjit Shekhar, Venu Madhav Chippa and Avinash Davidson from the University of Nottingham, as second runner up. Their design aims to integrate Lower Manhattan’s green spaces into the city fabric with a building which forms a ramp from Battery Park to the Greenwich South site, culminating in a Passive House skyscraper.
All three teams were awarded cash prizes and a place in the seventh international Multi-Comfort House Competition final in Prague, which takes place from 18 – 21 May 2011 and features a top prize of €1,500.
Students were also presented with awards in a ceremony in the Isover Multi-Comfort House Zone, at EcoBuild where they were joined by members of the judging panel including Roland Matzig, founder of r-m-p architects and engineers which consulted on the renovation of the world’s only Passive House skyscraper built to date in Germany; Nick Grant, technical director of the Passivhaus Trust, Bill Butcher, director of the Green Building Store; Anna Surgenor, senior technical advisor at the UK Green Building Council, John Prevoc, Make Architects and Gabriel Golumbeanu, international building concept developer at Saint-Gobain Isover’s international marketing department.
Stacey Davis, marketing director for Isover, comments: “The students have shown exceptional dedication, enthusiasm and commitment throughout the competition. Selecting the winners from the eight finalists was not an easy task and we would like to thank all of the judges for their time and expert input in choosing the three teams who will go on to compete in the international final.
“The standard of entries in this year’s Isover Multi-Comfort House competition was exceptionally high and demonstrates the growing emphasis universities are placing on sustainable design. These finalists are the up-and-coming architects of tomorrow so it is vital that we encourage and support them in developing creative solutions to meet the environmental challenge facing the construction industry. We wish our UK winners the best of luck in the international final.”
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