Mining her success: Xiaoxuan Lu gives Yixi talk
Xiaoxuan Lu (MLA ’12) has become a bit of a celebrity as a result of her YIXI talk (similar to TED Talks), combining her Penny White Fund research and her ASLA award-winning thesis.
Topic Sustainability
MDesS students win low-energy design competition
Two GSD student teams recently won first-place awards in the 2013-14 NESEA (Northeast Sustainable Energy Association) Net-Zero Energy Design Competition. The competition called for low-energy, high aesthetic architectural designs supported by energy simulation analysis for a variety of building types in Holyoke, Mass.
GSD team finalist for Hines Student Urban Design Competition
Five GSD students spent J-Term preparing their entry for the Urban Land Institute’s 2014 Gerald D. Hines Student Urban Design Competition and were rewarded with the news that they made it to the final round. The GSD team–Mikhail Thomas Grinwald (MArch), team leader Wajeha Qureshi (MDesS), PG-Human Smit (MUD), Aliza Sovani (MLA) and Sonja Vangjeli (MLA), advised by faculty adviser Richard Peiser– is 1 of four out of 163 in North America invited to compete for the grand prize.
Next Generation Infrastructure for Sustainable Environments
Zofnass Program for Sustainable Infrastructure at Harvard GSD awarded Surdna Foundation research grant.
Finding Opportunity in Disaster: GSD team wins Toyo University academic competition
A GSD urban planning team’s hopeful vision of a sustainable and resilient future for the Tohoku region of Japan - devastated by earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster in 2011 - has earned first prize in Toyo University’s Tohoku Recovery invitational academic competition. Maria Ignacia Arrasate (MDes), Elise Baudon (MUP), Natalia Gaerlan (MUP), Karina Gilbert (MAUD) and Trevor Johnson (MUP) collaborated on a team led by Kristen Hunter (DDes) and advised by Jerold Kayden (professor of urban planning and design). They will be traveling to Japan in February to receive the $10,000 award for their project “Here Today, Here Tomorrow.”
A new Center for Green Buildings and Cities at the GSD
The GSD will establish the Harvard Center for Green Buildings and Cities as one of the three major University initiatives supported by Evergrande Group, an integrated industry leader based in China.
GSD students and alums take on the urban resilience challenge
Mexico City was recently selected recently for the Rockefeller Foundation's 100 Resilient Cities Centennial Challenge, and 6 students and alums from the GSD and HKS contributed to that success. Acting as the Agencia de Resiliencia Urbana (Urban Resilience Collective), Adriana Chávez (MDesS and MArch '14), Víctor Rico Espínola (MAUD '14), Oscar Malaspina (MAUD '13), Elena Tudela (MAUD '12), Einat Rosenkrantz (MAUD '13) and Johanan Rivera (HKS MPAID '13) collaborated with Mexico City to create its winning proposal.
Loebs and GSD faculty and students introduce Laufen Manifesto for Humane Design
Design scholars and practitioners from around the world just released the Laufen Manifesto for a Humane Design Culture. They went public in a video that includes the voices of: Andres Lepik (LF ’12), Rahul Mehrotra (chair of urban planning and design), Christian Werthmann (former chair of department of landscape architecture), Martin Rauch (Austrian artist who collaborated on the Mudworks installation), Caroline James (MArch ‘14, Loeblogger and chair of Women in Development) and Anna Heringer (LF ’12), along with many others. Learn more about the principles they espouse.
Ecosistema Urbano’ Energy Carousel wins Taipei Award
Ecosistema Urbano, the firm of Belinda Tato and Jose Luis Vallejo (both design critics in urban planning and design), just won the Silver Award of the Taipei International Design Award 2013 in the Public Space Design category . Their "Energy carousel" is the creative embodiment of a more sustainable approach to urbanism.
Lukas Pauer publishes paper
Lukas Pauer (MAUD '14) will publish the essay “Peak Sand: On the Limits of Resource Extraction Urbanisms in the Straits of Singapore” in the forthcoming Critical Planning 20: The Future, a graduate student-run publication of the UCLA Urban Planning Department.