Comments for this competition by each Judge Kisho Kurokawa Although the number of applicants decreased from the previous year, there was great response to Membrane Design Competition 2001 from foreign countries, which brought about a highly successful result. A timely theme (related to disasters, refugees, the Earth, and the environment) was selected for this year's competition. This may be the reason that many entries presented very definitive membrane applications, including those that can immediately be put into effect. Unlike last year's competition, this year's adopted a public screening system. Furthermore, an opportunity for explanation was given to each applicant. Therefore, the jury was able to examine the entries more thoroughly. Each entry was examined and evaluated based on its proposal to the theme and its technical feasibility, as well as the design level, and digital presentation of the work. The seven prizewinning entries from the first prize winner down to those awarded for excellence were not very different from one another in content or expression level, and the jury's evaluations differed. The first-prize winner and the second-prize winner were, however, very different from each other in approach. The first-prize winner (presented by Redele and Iris) did not limit the types of objects of the theme. It is possible to say that this work made a conceptual proposal. It introduced the impressive technical capability of membrane to allow the rigidity of the entire structure to be maintained when the air in the air mat is purged. Furthermore, the fact that its space configuration can be expanded three-dimensionally along with the design was highly evaluated. It is regrettable that the work required a little more concrete expansion according to the theme. The second-prize winner (presented by Sarrablo and others) used a membrane itself as a parachute. The realistic application of dropping it from airplanes was excellent. Furthermore, once the membrane falls on the ground it can be used as it is as a shelter. This is the main point of this idea. A membrane with color stripes to increase its visibility was excellent from a design standpoint. Recently, I completed the membrane-based movable roof of Toyota Stadium. The application range of membranes will spread increasingly from now on. In view of this situation, I think that this competition will continue playing an important role in the future. Jun Aoki I don't think that the word "design" means creating something pretty. I think that it means giving some concrete ideas to problems so that the ideas will take form. This competition questioned participants on what concrete ideas are possible today, and when ideas can be expressed digitally, to answer the problem of saving our Earth. The idea proposed through the fine work presented by Tanner and Alex specifically answered this question. Moreover, the content of the work was very interesting. The idea proposed by the first-prize winner (Redele and Iris) seemed to detour from the problem of saving the Earth, but it was a very interesting study of membranes as small elements gathering and emerging as a concrete form. Although the proposal has not actually been tested for practical use, it was a good model for computer simulation. The digital presentation format was very suited to this entry. It seemed apparent that many participants in the past viewed digital technology merely as a tool for presentation, and I was also disappointed this year. It is a matter of course that digital technology can be a tool for presentation. I think, however, it is more interesting to see how digital technology can be applied to create concrete ideas and what kind of new designs (in a broad meaning) are possible with digital technology. Tadasu Ohe The presentation requirements of entries were raised to HTML level this year. The sponsor indicated that this may have decreased the number of applicants. In fact, however, the level of presentation went up markedly. The competition was indeed very successful. In past competitions, where a single drawing was presented by each applicant, there were a large number of applications but more than half of them did not deserve screening. It was impressive that there were no such entries this time. The coincidence of the level of digitization and the grade of advancement in content is found in the architectural education of universities. In the past, there was inconsistency in that students who were good at designing could not use computers while those who were able to use computers were not good at designing. It can be said, however, that this inconsistency completely disappeared in the past several years. Nevertheless, it is the university education of Japan itself that denies such possibilities to its students. Presently, as far as the meaning and content of digitization are concerned, Japanese university teachers are behind their students in awareness. The teachers should examine themselves. The results of the preliminary screening of this competition clearly showed the "recession" in Japanese education. Teachers should open their eyes to this fact. Most of the entries from students who received Japanese education were not able to reach the final screening stage. My criteria in the final screening of this competition attached importance to how each work treated space. Unlike other proposals, the one made by the first-prize winner (Redele and Iris) created space with a unique approach. The other prize winners made proposals for dropping shelters with parachutes or setting up shelters with greenery-treated surfaces, which I felt were rather mediocre ideas. This may have differentiated the first-prize winner from the second-prize winner. Digitizing is meaningful if it is used not only for the closed interior of the work but expanded to connect the work with space. Kazuhiro Kojima This year's theme was quite serious. Participants were asked to make a space proposal for this serious theme. At the time of the preliminary screening, quite a few proposals were simply reports stating that the participants had studied the sound logic of architecture at this opportunity. They were caught by the usual traps because they regarded the Earth's environment as a entire. The proposals that remained at the final stage of presentations were divided into two types. One was a type that broke through the trap from the front. The other type narrowed down the range to pin-point the target. The former tried to show the entire image of their response to concrete problems while the latter showed methods of solving the problems. The first-prize winner (Redele and Iris) was the champion of the latter type. The second- and third-prize winners were of the former type. The proposal made by the first-prize winner showed a method but it did not show the entire image. The method was not entirely original, but the work emphasized the possibilities of the method in a thorough manner. This could be seen as well in the attractive live performance using a model and a vacuum cleaner in a selection stage that called for digital presentation. The presentation informed us that the artists had repeated experiments to create their proposal. The second-prize winner (Sarrablo and others) put a serious situation into concrete terms and tried to solve the problem with the unique idea of the applicants as architects. Their visual and live presentation was attractive. The relationship was, however, weak between their proposal and the key point that the swelling of the shelter was secured when the parachute opened, descended, and touched down. It is regrettable that the third-prize winner (Nara and Uryu) did not show the compactness of the shelter more elaborately. They should have added some ideas that would be enabled only by their small shelter. The number of attractive proposals using membranes this time seemed to show that many architectural possibilities are not limited to emergency or refuge purposes. The levels of the higher prize winners were certainly quite high. Shigeru Ban This year's competition theme was Membranes Saving The Global Environment. As expected, most applicants created entries with the concept of countermeasures against disasters or the promotion of global environmental conservation and improvement. Therefore, many entries were seen to treat membranes as hypothetical images. In extreme cases, three prize-winning entries proposed the concept of the disappearance of the membrane after it finishes its role. The work NICHE (Shimizu and Kato), which reached the final screening in public, was one of these. The jury highly evaluated the viewpoint that the process of tree planting in deserts could be seen on the Internet via NICHE. There were some questions as to whether the concept was proper for the membrane design competition. As a result, it was treated as a work of excellence. The proposal for shelters for refugees (Nara and Uryu) that won third prize was based on a scenario that the shelter in combination with plants is made of a biodegradable membrane that disappears when its role is finished. A green tract of land remains as a result. I thought their idea of membrane generation along with their design of the membrane structure was excellent. The proposal for shelter parachutes (Sarrablo and others) that won second prize was based on the easy-to-understand concept of using parachutes as a solution to gain access to disaster-stricken areas sooner than any other means, and to divert the parachutes into refugee shelters. The colorful design of the parachutes descending one after another became the center of attention at the preliminary screening. The work TRANS it (Redele and Iris), which won first prize, showed a unique structural membrane system. The idea of inserting a substance into the double film and combining the substance with the air extracted from the membrane to generate a film element with variable rigidity, which is contrary to idea of an air film, was highly evaluated. As indicated by the design concept, the work aims to create space with a flexible support structure, based on geodetic principles. The wrinkled, heat-insulating membrane is interesting. Furthermore, their analog model used at the digital presentation stage was unique. New York's World Trade Center was destroyed by terrorism before the preliminary screening was held. If the terrorists' attack had taken place before the closing date of the competition, what would have happened? Proposals for membrane applications as countermeasures against terrorism might have been made. > BACK TO TOP