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Introduction

WHY ARE ARCHITECTURAL COMPETITIONS IMPORTANT?

Many competitions offer exciting opportunities for architects to explore new ideas and theories.
Without competitions to initiate the creative process, many important visions would never have existed. Without the architects utilizing competitions in order to test the urban proposals, these designers would never have been able to submit their concepts. There would never have been the Pompidou centre in Paris, nor would there have been the conversion of the Bankside power station to Tate Modern in London, to name just a few examples here.

The freedom found in competition work is a welcome breath of fresh air because one is truly designing for oneself and it is a challenge to one's own preconceived ideas. It is about the constant search for vision. One of the greatest contributions of competitions is that they provide us the means for the public to relate to the architect's ideas.

We had for example the National September 11th Memorial & Museum Open International design competition in New York and the International design competition for the Guggenheim museum in Helsinki. Hundreds of competition submissions were put on display for the benefit of families and the public not usually familiar with the design profession, and for those who admired their creativity. The technical aspects may have been difficult to grasp but they were able to appreciate the graphics and comprehend the ideas or vision underlying the presentations. These competition entries allowed the public to be inspired and excited about modern architectural ideas.

The argument that it is galling not to always win the competition is beside the point. It is always exciting and a privilege to take part in these important enterprises because they enable one to contribute and to feel involved. The process of the competition is just as important as the result. Although it is not always possible to win, it is the sense of joy, pride and achievement one receives from these competitions that matters. Often competitions have a short time limit and it is a challenge to think and create in that time span.

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We use the competitions to improve ourselves as designers, our values, our ideas, a way of thinking for the benefit of the public and the users, always the opportunity is present to advance one's mind-sets, and it is exciting.
Our reward is to be able to use these new tools to communicate our concepts.

Competitions constantly focus upon new ideas and keep us alert. They continue to challenge us as thinkers.

The Italian futurists from the early 20th Century once understood that it was not always possible to build their proposals but that was not the main objective. Drawings, sketches, volume studies, models were all vehicles for the creators to display their proposals of the most revolutionary kind. It was the best means by which to provoke the public to start pondering and to help them reform their conventional thinking.

As Louis Kahn once said, 'Architecture is the reaching out for the truth'. The architect here is the creator in the truest sense of the word, reaching out for the ultimate attainment. If he cannot reach out for the truth, if he cannot be loyal to his concepts, than he should not be an architect.
Competitions give us a wonderful means of assessing conditions, or situations and allowing us to experiment, play and explore new ideas.
I would urge every designer not to forget their motivation and to understand the importance of competitions.
May our future thrive in the knowledge that we can continue to use these design competitions as the best means by which to create, test and play with our ideas for future projects.

I hope the readers will enjoy this website.

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