Gauja National Park Footbridge International Architecture Competition
Gauja National Park Footbridge International Architecture Competition now is over!
International architecture competition, organised by Bee Breeders and Latvia’s largest national park, celebrating its 45th anniversary they task architecture enthusiasts with designing an entryway footbridge.
About Competition
Latvia’s largest national park celebrates its 45th anniversary by tasking architecture enthusiasts with designing an entryway footbridge.
Known for the scale of diverse wildlife and varied landscapes within, the Gauja National Park is a popular tourist attraction in one of the greenest and most naturally stunning countries in the world.
Spanning over 917 km2, the Gauja National Park in Vidzeme is the largest national park in Latvia, a country known for its low population density and vast areas of natural forests. The park takes its name from the Gauja River Valley and was one of Latvia’s first national parks, established in 1973, but with a history of tourism supposedly dating back to the 19th century.
With so many national parks in Eastern Europe, the Gauja National Park stands out for its varied landscape, featuring slopes, springs, valleys, caves, as well as the sandstone and dolomite cliffs that are one its biggest tourist attractions, all located within close proximity. Full to the brim with diverse wildlife and plant species, it is also home to more than 500 historic and cultural monuments such as castles, manors, churches, watermills, and windmills.
The Gauja National Park Footbridge International Architecture Competition is sourcing designs for a footbridge to serve as a symbolic entrance to the park in honor of its 45th anniversary. As the footbridge would be suspended over a road, it must be high enough for trucks and buses to pass underneath it. It must also be capable of bearing the weight of high volumes of pedestrian foot traffic, and should feature welcome and goodbye signage as well as park information stand.
Participants are tasked with thinking about the buildability of their designs, and ensuring that they correspond with the context of the national park and being welcoming to visitors, while at the same time displaying innovation and the potential to become an internationally recognized landmark.
THE COMPETITION SITE
The competition site is the entry point to the Gauja National Park. It is located on the border with the nearby Sigulda town. There are no set boundaries to the site, only the recommended location with the footbridge extending across the P8 highway towards the park.
Submission requirements:
• Participants are required to upload 4 x A2 landscape-orientated presentation boards (must not exceed 5mb per jpg) with sketches, renderings, plans, sections, elevations, diagrams, and/or other presentation tools to explain their proposal.
• No video files are accepted.
• All information provided in writing must be in English.
• All submissions must be uploaded via the beebreeders.com upload panel.
Registration period close on 26 Aprile, 2019, but you can submit your project until 11 June, 2019, (11:59pm GMT+0).
Consultative jury will select 40 shortlisted from all submitted entries, after that core jury panel will evaluate the 9 finalists and select the top 3 winning projects and 6 honorable mentions.
The winners will be announced on 11 June, 2019.
Design proposals can be developed individually or by teams (4 team members maximum).
Entry fees:
• Early Bird Registration (November 11 - December 14) is US $90, instead for a students is US $70.
• Advance Registration (December 15 - February 22) is US $120, instead for a students is US $100.
• Last Minute Registration (February 23 - April 26) is US $140, instead for a students is US $120.
Eligibility
This Gauja National Park Footbridge International Architecture Competition is open to all. No professional qualification is required.