Application Deadline: November 1, 2017

The Berkeley Undergraduate Prize for Design Excellence endowment was established in the Department of Architecture at the University of California, Berkeley College of Environmental Design to promote the investigation of architecture as a social art. Each year the PRIZE Committee selects a topic important to the understanding of the interaction of people and the built world that becomes the focus of the Essay Competition. This year the topic is: Applying the Social Art of Architecture.

ESSAY QUESTION

QUESTION:

In your city, how do individual communities demonstrate their presence through the buildings designed to serve that group’s social and cultural needs and endeavors?

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Stage 1: Enter

Steps to Enter

1. Meet the Eligibility Requirements.
2. Write a 500-word proposal for an essay on this year’s Essay Question, as posted.
3. Provide one photograph each of your chosen projects.
4. Submit the essay and photographs online.

Eligibility

1. The competition is open to all current full-time registered students in an undergraduate architecture degree program or undergraduates majoring in architecture in accredited schools of architecture worldwide. Diploma in Architecture students who have not yet completed their Diploma are also eligible.
2. Essays must be submitted in English.
3. Finalists will be required to provide proof of current registration in the form of copies of actual school transcripts. You are still eligible to compete if you were an undergraduate student on September 15, 2016, but graduate before the awards are scheduled to be given.

Team Up

Two students (maximum) who meet the eligibility requirements above may collaborate as authors. An architecture student may team up with another undergraduate in architecture, landscape architecture, urban studies, arts and humanities, the social sciences, or engineering. If two students collaborate, then both names must appear on their essay and if awarded a prize, the prize is to be equally shared.

Photograph Requirement

You are asked to include digital photographs of your selected building(s) or place(s) with your essay. The photographs should be at a minimum 500 pixels wide, and in .jpg format. No more than three photographs will be accepted. You can use a digital camera, a film camera (and scan the printed image), or capture the image on a cell phone. The photographs should be as informative as possible in order to enable those reading the essays to determine how well you have described your subject matter.

Semi Finalist

From the pool of essay proposals received, approximately 25 are selected by the PRIZE Committee as particularly promising. The selected individual students, or student teams, become Semifinalists.

These Semifinalists are invited to submit a 2,500-word essay, again in English, expanding on their proposals. A group of readers, composed of Committee members and invited colleagues, selects five-to-eight of the best essays and sends these Finalist essays to a jury of international academics and architects to select the winners.

BERKELEY PRIZE Travel Fellowship.

At the conclusion of the Essay Competition submittals, all Semifinalists are also invited to submit for a BERKELEY PRIZE Travel Fellowship.

Travel Fellowship candidates are asked to submit a proposal for a specific plan of travel and study away from their academic institution during their Summer break for 2018. The Travel Fellowship provides a fixed stipend adequate to pay for a round-trip airfare from the city in which you are studying to the destination and back and to pay for lodging, food, and incidentals during your stay, normally enough for three weeks.

Purse

There is a total prize of 25,000USD, minimum 7,500USD first prize.  The remaining purse is to be allocated at the discretion of the Jury.

Calendar

For More Information:

Visit the Official Webpage of the Berkeley Undergraduate Prize for Design Excellence 2018