The Third Q-City International Young Designer Competition | Contest

Handan Municipal People’s Government are very glad to announce the first Open call of international urban design competition in 2020: The Third Q-City International Young Designer Competition (China·Handan). Public space quality has become an important representative measure for urban competiveness these days. The “Smart” era is now driven by creative technological advancements, and it is integrating, intricately, into the improvements of our city and the way we interact with people, with space and with information in our everyday lives. The theme selected for this competition is “Quality City Development Guided by New Technology”, it is to take on a micro approach to a specific site Renmin Road directly, rather than the general macro overall approach to the urban design of Handan City. The competition places an emphasis on new science, technology and social perspective equally, and competitors are asked to start off with a future lifestyle, providing a new sample for the creative development of future city through smart design, in hopes of improving the quality of its citizen’s life and its harmony with nature.

As an exploration to improving quality of urban public space, this competition is an exploration of innovative and or artistic approaches. The competition places an emphasis on new science, technology and social perspective equally, which is based on urban renewal/repair functions, the integration of smart health or sports facilities, intelligent urban furniture, interactive art installations, intelligent lighting and way-finding systems that can inspire urban vitality. Competitors are encouraged to start off with a future lifestyle, providing a new sample for the creative development of future city through new technologies such as 3D-printing, 5G technology, and artificial intelligence and smart design, to provide residents with a better quality of life, and ultimately to achieve the goals of livability and natural harmony in the city.

HANDAN CITY
This year’s competition site is in Handan City, Hebei Province, which contains both historical value and potentials in development.
Based on the daily activities of citizens, through field investigation and digital data collection, the competitors are asked to comprehensively analyzes the users along Renmin Road (between Handan East Station and Garden Expo Station), and to explore methods of improving the quality of urban space.
Focus should be placed on improving the quality of urban space, convenient urban services and facilities, smart urban furniture, smart street, public art or installations and other issues, one or more of the previously mentioned topics could be included in the competitor’s design.
Participants can submit an independent work or a series of entries. Multiple entries are not accepted. The series works refer to the series of creations under the same theme, while production-oriented repetitive patchwork is discouraged.

Participants are also encouraged to select sites and design theme by themselves, discovering and finding solutions for urban issues in a bottom-up approach under the theme of “Planning and Design for Beautiful Hebei”. Self-selected site should be real site in the city of Handan. Photos, satellite images and videos of the site are required in submission materials.

Submission guidelines:

• Create diverse and interesting places for Handan citizens and tourists. Design should be original;
• Design should consider the most cutting-edge technology, such as 5G, AI, 3D printing, etc., reflecting the power of science and technology;
• Project should be designed with a comprehensive consideration of local history, culture, and natural environment of Handan with its regional features highlighted;
• The sustainability of materials and operation should be considered;
• The selection of material, and the form of construction should all be feasible;
• Designs should fully consider diverse needs of different groups of people and provide citizens and tourists urban spaces for activities.

Submission requirements:

The panel size shall be A1 (594mm x 841mm), landscape orientation, 3 panels required for each submission (at least 3 panels should be submitted). Provide panels that can fully express the creative intention of the work, such as general layout, renderings, plan, elevation, section drawing, enlarged key drawing and diagrams, etc., as well as design description (combined within the panel) of about 500 words, there are no limits on the scale and effect of all drawings on panel.
If there are physical models, photos of the physical models can be included.

Please submit the drawing layout (300 dpi, long side is more than 1500 pixels) in the version of jpg.

Appended materials (Design Texts, Videos, Model etc.) can be submitted as auxiliary instructions of the design.

The official language of the competition is Chinese and English (English must be included in the language of title and main design description).

There is no entry fee to participate!

It's free to enter!

This urban design competition is open to international or national young designers and artists, teams of teachers and students in the fields of planning, architecture, landscape, art and intelligent design. Meanwhile, interdisciplinary professionals or practitioners and representatives of new technology and new energy research institutions are encouraged to participate.

The following prizes will be awarded:

• 1st Prize – (1 Team) Honor Certificate + Bonus 300,000 RMB (Before Tax, Around 43,000 USD) Each
• 2nd Prize – (4 Teams) Honor Certificate + Bonus 100,000 RMB (Before Tax, Around 14,000 USD) Each
• 3rd Prize – (10 Teams) Honor Certificate + Bonus 30,000 RMB (Before Tax, Around 4,300 USD) Each
• Honourable Mentions (Several Teams): Honor Certificate + UED Magazine

For all further information about you need to consult the official website: http://en.uedmagazine.net/index.html