Seven Ball State University students from the College of Architecture and Planning were a highlight at the American Institute of Architecture Students-Kawneer competition.
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Senior architecture major Eric Laine won first place and senior architecture major Greg Hittler won third place. Honorable mentions were given to Kelly Goffiney, Lauren Comes, James Moehring, Jessie Rabideau and Jonathon Meier.
Guillermo Vasquez de Velasco, dean of the College of Architecture and Planning, said the awards showed how competitive the college is.
'We are extremely proud of the group of students and faculty that guided the work,' he said. 'It is very telling how stronger our students are.'
The AIAS-Kawneer Municipal Courthouse design competition consists of individual students or teams having to choose one of five U.S. metropolitan areas enlisted by the organization. The designers had to do research on the community, learn the materials needed and work on a design that would fit with the city's environment.
For the students, the competition began at an earlier level inside the College of Architecture and Planning. An internal competition was organized to encourage students to participate.
Laine said the project began on October and concluded the first week of December.
'It took only two or three all nighters, but many late nights,' he said.
Laine said students presented their work to local architects and professors during the two months.
'Each time we take the feedback into consideration and update our design decisions, and the final product is always better for it,' he said. 'The thing about the architecture school is that we are constantly thinking and talking about our projects, whether to the dean, professors or other students.'
For the competition, Laine worked on the design for a municipal courthouse in Portland, Ore. He said he combined sustainable elements and functional principles to his design.
'The idea was to fuse these principles with the functional aspects of the building, creating a cohesive environmentally responsible building,' he said. 'It's not 'in your face' green architecture, simply architecture the way it should be, respecting the occupant as well as the environment.'
Mahesh Senagala, chairman of the Department of Architecture, said although every student in the College of Architecture and Planning was invited to submit their work to the national competition, only 10 were recognized internally.
'For the internal competition we encouraged cooperative work,' he said.
For the national competition, Ball State was one of 31 universities enlisted.
'It is unusual that we got so many distinctions,' Vasquez de Velasco said. 'Usually each school wins one award, but this year we swept the competition. Only one other school won second place.'
The College of Architecture was recently named one of the top three schools in the country to excel in digital design and fabrication by Architect Magazine. It was also named one of six schools nationwide committed to social justice.
'It is an expression of the quality of the program in the college of architecture,' Senagala said.
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