Clifford Wong Prize in Housing Design
2023 Clifford Wong Prize in Housing Design: Randy Crandon and Maddie Farrer "Sidewalk Stuff: Adaptive Reuse Cohousing"
The Clifford Wong Prize in Housing Design call for applications is currently open.
Submissions are due Monday, May 12, 2025 at 12:00pm (noon) EDT.
Start the process sufficiently prior to noon to ensure your submission has time to upload fully before the deadline.
This year a $28,200 prize is to be awarded from an endowed fund established in 1991 in memory of Hong Kong architect/developer Clifford C. F. Wong.
Find out more information on how to submit in the GSD Now Clifford Wong Prize in Housing Design tray.
Questions may be submitted to Anna Lyman in Academic Affairs.
Clifford Wong Prize in Housing Design
Established in 1990 by a generous gift from Nelson K. Chen (AB ’75, MArch ’78), the Clifford Wong Prize in Housing Design is an annual prize created in memory of Hong Kong architect and developer, Clifford C. F. Wong. The prize aims to help re-establish the essential role of architects in society to provide not only the fundamental needs of human shelter but to meet the challenge of designing creative solutions for improving living environments.
The Clifford Wong Prize in Housing Design recognizes a multi-family housing design that incorporates the most interesting ideas and/or innovations that may lead to socially oriented, improved living environments. Students in all GSD programs are invited to submit a project that considers today’s challenges posed in housing design. The prize may be awarded for a design executed by a single student or by several students working in collaboration in a regular GSD core or option studio, thesis, or independent study course completed during the current academic year. Projects performed as independent studies outside the GSD or as part of a professional commission will not be eligible.
The winning prize entry is chosen by a faculty committee selected each year by the Dean. The quality of the overall design effort will be taken into account, but the prize will not necessarily be awarded for the most mature and complete design effort; therefore, students in core and options studios that focus on multiple housing are invited to submit entries regardless of their levels of advancement. The housing design may be complete with respect to site planning, unit and landscape design, means of construction, and overall visual expression, or the design may focus on one or more aspects of the design. Entries should illustrate how the housing design relates to its urban, suburban, or rural settings. However, large-scale, urban design projects where housing is merely a minor element will not be eligible.
Recent recipients include:
2024: “Tectonics of Tenure: Public Infrastructure for Collective Housing” by Magdalen Elizabeth Musante (MArch I ’24)
2023: “Sidewalk Stuff: Adaptive Reuse Cohousing” by Randy Crandon (MArch I ’25) and Maddie Farrer (MArch I ’25)
2022: “People’s Park Complex: Repairing the Modern City” by Brian Lee (MArch ’22)
2021: “Up from the Past: Housing as Reparations on Chicago’s South Side” by Isabel Strauss (MArch I ’21) and “Cripping Architecture” by Shaina Yang (MArch I ’21)
2020: “A House is Not a Home” by Qin Ye Chen (MArch I ’22) and Yiwen Wang (MArch I AP ’22)
2019: “A Giant Among Us” by Son Vu (MArch I ’21) and Alex Yueyan Li (MArch I AP ’21)
2018: “Dwelling + Ground: Terraformed Housing for Port-Au-Prince” by Belle Verwaay (MArch ’18)