RE-THINK SURFACE

Sturgess Architecture (Jeremy Sturgess, Vancouver) -- Vancouver Primary Winner -- "Future buildings must produce rather than consume. All buildings located on primary sites should offer the city more than just density. In order to develop buildings that are ecologically friendly and sustainable, we must RE-THINK the traditional building components. THINK of the building as a variety of productive SURFACES."

Harvest Green Project

Romses Architecture (Scott Romses, Vancouver) -- Vancouver Secondary Winner -- "Harvest Green challenges the status quo of how energy and food is produced and delivered in our city, neighbourhoods, and individual single-family homes. Mobile nomadic prefab laneway homes ('ModPods') are proposed to provide adaptable affordable housing for the city that will also offer sustainable energy and urban farming infrastructure for the immediate home as well as the city at large."

Go Design Collaborative (Jennifer Uegama and Pauline Thimm, Vancouver) -- Vancouver Wildcard Winner -- "At Vancouver’s waterfront 'gateways', transportation, services, industry and homes collide. To protect industrial and agricultural land from condo development, DENcity : INTENcity proposes an energy-efficient large-span, "stacked" structure that permits endless reconfiguration and occupation. It would stand in Marpole as a beacon of Vancouver's commitment to bold innovation."

Community Catalyst

Garon Sebastien and Chris Foyd (Vancouver) -- Vancouver Primary Honourable Mention -- "Community gardens foster neighbourhood exchange and build community. Social, ecological and economic benefits include a sustainable food system, food independence, teaching tools, safer places for kids to play, connection with nature, heat-island-effect reduction, stormwater retention, greywater reuse, decreased pressure on existing infrastructure, wildlife habitat, and composting programs."

Harvest Green Project

Romses Architecture (Scott Romses, Vancouver) -- Vancouver Primary Honourable Mention -- "Harvest Green Project explores the notion of 'foregrounding' a new agri-food system in and around the strategic urban location of an arterial transit hub. Traditional farming simply cannot sustain our increasing population. Incorporating urban farming prominently into the fabric of the city is a way to reassert the cultural and environmental importance of locally produced food.

Eco-Density Now!

Acme Architecture (Keith Rivera, Santa Barbara, CA) -- Vancouver Secondary Honourable Mention -- "Balancing built form and landscape, three residences increase the allowable density of this secondary residential lot by 50 per cent, while maintaining 60 per cent of the site as usable open space. Repeated along the block, this forms an urban pattern of sustainable courtyard housing. Water management, food gardens and renewable energy systems foster a greener lifestyle."

Half-tonne Block

CMO (Miller/Miller/Cavens, Vancouver) -- Vancouver Secondary Honourable Mention -- "The half-tonne block (HTB) project takes low-density residential blocks near high-capacity transit and increases the number of residents by 300 per cent while reducing the block's total greenhouse gas emissions by 60 per cent, resulting in per capita emissions of just one-half tonne. Ultra-energy-efficient laneway housing and electric co-op vehicles help to meet the target."

Form S_hift Density S_hift Grid S_hift Social S_hift Energy S_hift

GBL Architects Inc. (Vancouver ) -- Vancouver Wildcard Honourable Mention -- "This project consolidates a Vancouver Primary site with a Vancouver Secondary site. Residential lots have been split in half and existing housing moved toward the street. Parking is underground on the primary site. Lanes become green space and the commercial podium and residential 'tower' have been cleft apart to permit light and views through the site."

Dreams of Vertical Topographies

Public Architecture and Communication (Vancouver ) -- Vancouver Wildcard Honourable Mention -- "In a city that has adopted the high-rise point tower as a typology for both dwelling and commerce, it's worth speculating how it would accommodate Vancouver at play. This proposal takes emerging districts of work and public life such as the Broadway Corridor and asks 'What would a sustainable high-rise community building with a library, galleries, theatres and media technology look like?'"

Cultivating Wilderness

Idette de Boer & Magali Bailey (Vancouver) -- Vancouver Wildcard Honourable Mention -- "This project challenges the premise that we stand outside or apart from nature. It makes urban design a steward of nature through a bridge that melds the human and the natural world. The project includes wildlife habitat, an animal rehabilitation center and services for humans to strengthen our symbiotic relationships."

Rooftop Green Pixels

Wang Yiming (Burnaby) -- Vancouver Wildcard Honourable Mention -- "The rooftops of existing Vancouver towers are generally leftover space made of hard and reflective surface materials that become a significant contributor to the urban-heat-island effect. This project aims to fix the problem by building a self-sufficient, habitable rooftop structure that provides new space, solar energy generation, and heat and water exchanges with the existing building."