contest

3D Printing for Peace

- Adam Clare

3D printing got a lot of attention recently because an American organization found a way to print a handgun. A direct reaction to that has been to launch a contest to promote the true potential of 3D printing by having a contest which encourages people to create designs that better the world.

It’s obvious that 3D printing isn’t inherently evil and that it can really shake up a lot of existing industries. Just think about printing your own replace parts for objects in your home or even printing food. Last year I put up a short primer on 3D printing on my game design blog.

The contest is being run by Michigan Tech and this is what the contest is looking for:

  • low-cost medical devices
  • tools to help pull people out of poverty
  • designs that can reduce racial conflict
  • objects to improve energy efficiency or renewable energy sources to reduce wars over oil
  • tools that would reduce military conflict and spending while making us all safer and more secure
  • things that boost sustainable economic development (e.g. designs for appropriate technology in the developing world to reduce scarcity)

Find out more at Michigan Tech.

Vote on ReBurbia Finalists

- Adam Clare

Dwell and Inahbitat have announced the finalists for ReBurbia! You can vote at their website for your favourite idea.

The submissions range from totally impossible to easy to implement to insanely practical.

I really like the AIRBIA idea because it looks slick and just imagine a city with dirigibles functioning similarly to commuter trains.

airbia

ReBurbia: Make the Suburbs Livable Contest

- Adam Clare 1 Comment

Inhabitat and Dwell are holding a contest to redesign the suburbs into a sustainable and livable place. The contest is called ReBurbia and they are encouraging wild and crazy ideas to be submitted. If you have an idea to make the suburbs a place for humans to live then you should enter the contest – you better hurry though because the deadline is July 31st.

Calling all future-forward architects, urban designers, renegade planners and imaginative engineers:
Show us how you would re-invent the suburbs! What would a McMansion become if it weren’t a single-family dwelling? How could a vacant big box store be retrofitted for agriculture? What sort of design solutions can you come up with to facilitate car-free mobility, ‘burb-grown food, and local, renewable energy generation? We want to see how you’d design future-proof spaces and systems using the suburban structures of the present, from small-scale retrofits to large-scale restoration—the wilder the better!

Via Spacing.

The Self-Sufficient City

- Adam Clare

Looking to save the world? Then enter the international competition to design the self-sufficient city. One of the goals is to spur some online discussion, so what do you think the city of the future will look like? And will you enter the contest?

The competition jury, which is composed of architects, directors of some of the world’s foremost architecture schools, and mayors of cities such as Barcelona, is looking for outstanding proposals for any city in the world, at any scale, and within any timescale. Competition entries should be submitted via the Internet (www.advancedarchitecturecontest.org) on Connected metropolises, Eco neighborhoods, Self-sufficient buildings, Intelligent homes or any other proposal for a short-, medium or long-term project to create habitats that respond to the social, cultural, environmental and economic conditions that may obtain in the 21st century. The proposal should include whatever texts, drawings and other images may be needed to make it fully understandable.
The competition prizes will consist of three scholarships for the IaaC Masters in Advanced Architecture for academic year 2010-11, cash prizes, and the latest generation of large-format HP printers. The selected projects will go on show in a major exhibition, due to open in Barcelona in May 2010, which will then travel to key cities around the world. The best projects will also be featured in a book to be published by Actar. The project is supported by the Spanish Ministry of Housing, the Generalitat de Catalunya, Barcelona City Council, and the publishing house Actar.

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