Architecture Competition Held

Architecture Competition Held

On Tuesday, November 16, 2010, the students in AET 355, Engineering Mechanics, presented their projects for the juried Sculpture in Tension (and Compression) competition. This event marks the third annual design competition in this class, which is taught by Dr. Christian Carloni. The students had to design and build an original sculpture in which each member is in tension or compression only. The jurors for this competition were Sharon L. Vasquez, provost of the University of Hartford; Louis Manzione, dean of CETA; Mike Crosbie, chair of the Department of Architecture in CETA; Edward Allen, architect and teacher; and Dr. Carloni.

The competition was won by Anthony Papa and Amberlynn Rodriguez, whose sculpture is shown below. They received a gift certificate to the University Book Store for their efforts. Runners up were Domenick Gagliardi and Jacob Hajjar; Maegan Hall and Shana Italiano; Benjamin Schuetz and Stephen Sorak; and Garret Lord and Martin Chase.

Following the presentations, Edward Allen presented a lecture called “Big Adventures with Small Structures,” in which he discussed various small-scale built projects in which he used vaults, trusses, and enhanced post-and-beam framing. His purpose, he said, “is to convince students that they can do interesting structures even on very small projects; they need not wait for a chance to do a major bridge or roof.”

Allen taught architectural design, building construction, and structural design full time at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for thirteen years before leaving to develop his architectural practice and write a series of textbooks. His titles include Stone Shelters; How Buildings Work; Fundamentals of Building Construction; The Architect’s Studio Companion; Shaping Structures: Statics; Fundamentals of Residential Construction;, Architectural Detailing; and Form and Forces: Designing Efficient, Expressive Structures. Nearly every school of architecture in North America and many in foreign countries use one or more of these titles as texts. Most of them have been published in at least one foreign language translation. Mr. Allen is the founder and for many years was the editor and publisher of Connector, a newsletter that has been influential in changing the way technical subjects are taught in schools of architecture. He has lectured and taught on four continents and has conducted architectural research on a fifth. Following an appointment as Pietro Belluschi Distinguished Professor of Architectural Design at the University of Oregon in 1997, he has retained a visiting appointment at that institution, where he was instrumental in founding the world’s only graduate program in technical teaching for teachers of architecture. He is a fellow of the American Institute of Architects. In 2005 he was awarded jointly by the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture and the American Institute of Architects the Topaz Medallion for Excellence in Architectural Education, the highest honor in this field.

CETA congratulates the winners of the Sculpture in Tension (and Compression) competition.

 the winning sculpture (top) and one of the studies done by the students in preparation for building the sculpture.

Below are various other entries in the competition.