School Projects Recognized With AIA Awards

WASHINGTON — Several school facilities were recognized with American Institute of Architects 2009 honor awards, a program that was created to honor excellence in architecture, interior architecture and urban design.
More then 700 projects were submitted from around the world. The AIA will recognize 25 of the submissions at its annual conference in San Francisco in April.

Architecture Award

Charles Hostler Student Center, Beirut, Lebanon; VJAA: The Hostler Center integrates social gathering spaces for students and faculty with sports facilities, a theater and underground parking. Challenging the idea of a single large-scale building and similarly scaled open plaza, the project instead proposes multiple building volumes interconnected into a continuous field of habitable space by its gardens and green roofs.

The Gary Comer Youth Center, Chicago; John Ronan Architects: This 74,000-square-foot youth center, located in one of Chicago’s poorest neighborhoods, demonstrates a commitment to social progress by providing a constructive environment for area youths to spend their after-school hours. The center provides support for the programs of a 300-member drill team/performance group for children ages 8 to 18 and provides space for various youth educational and recreational programs for disadvantaged children to better their chances of success in life.

The Lavin-Bernick Center for University Life, New Orleans; VJAA: The challenge was to transform a rigidly compartmentalized and environmentally inefficient building into a dynamic, sustainable new university center. Only the existing concrete structure was retained, saving roughly $8 million in construction costs. The project was successfully completed for $189 per square foot, 14 months after Hurricane Katrina. Many of the sustainable design strategies used — canopies, shutters, balconies, and fans — were adapted from climate-responsive architecture traditional to New Orleans.
Interior Architecture Award

School of American Ballet, New York City; Diller Scofidio + Renfro: The expansion project for the School of American Ballet is located in the official training academy for the New York City Ballet. The 8,200-square-foot project includes the addition of two new dance studios within the space of two existing studios. Like nesting dolls, each of the new studios is housed in the volume of the existing facilities.

Sheila C. Johnson Design Center, New York City; Lyn Rice Architects: The Sheila C. Johnson Design Center establishes a new 32,800-square-foot campus nexus for Parsons The New School for Design by uniting and comprehensively reorganizing the street-level spaces of the school’s four discrete buildings around a new campus quad. The center performs as an expansive urban threshold that draws together the school’s creative programs and its vibrant Greenwich Village context.