Renowned architect to visit Stuckeman to juror student design competition

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Tod Williams, co-founder of the renowned architecture firm Tod Williams and Billie Tsien Architects, will present a lecture about his firm’s work with stone and masonry titled “Building Blocks” at 6:30 p.m. April 18 in the Stuckeman Family Building’s North Forum on the University Park campus.

The lecture is part of the Department of Architecture's annual National Concrete Masonry Association (NCMA) second-year student competition within the College of Arts and Architecture’s Stuckeman School. Williams will be joined by Alex Odom, a project manager with the firm.

Founded by Williams and Billie Tsien in Manhattan in 1986, Tod Williams and Billie Tsien Architects focuses its work on academic institutions, museums, cultural centers, residences and non-profit organizations. The practice has been significantly influenced by the duo’s backgrounds in architecture and fine art; however, the work also reflects a collaborative effort that grows out of their relationship as a married couple, said Williams.

In their early work, Williams and Tsien experimented with unconventional materials and reconsidered how familiar materials could be used in unfamiliar ways in designs for installations at the Museum of the Chinese in the Americas in New York and elsewhere.

In their later work, Williams and Tsien were commissioned to prepare a plan for new buildings at the Cranbrook Estate in Michigan. Their design developed ideas of movement and path embodied in their earlier designs for academic buildings in California, at Princeton University and the University of Virginia. The co-educational natatorium at Cranbrook was planned to connect to existing buildings, and large oculi and doors enable the building to be opened up during spring and summer, connecting the building to the landscapes of the Cranbrook Estate.

Residential designs for sites in New York City, Long Island and Phoenix have enabled Williams and Tsien to explore issues of materiality, path and the integration of building with site at another scale.

Tod Williams and Billie Tsien Architects has received more than two dozen awards from the American Institute of Architects, including the Firm of the Year Award in 2013. That same year, Williams and Tsien were each awarded a National Medal of Arts from former President Barack Obama. Among other awards and recognitions is a 2014 International Fellowship from the Royal Institute of British Architects.

The experience for second-year architecture students at Penn State has been defined by participation in an internal competition generously funded by the NCMA’s Education and Research Foundation. Students and faculty members take a trip to New York City with funding from the NCMA Foundation — in the form of a faculty grant — for students to explore where the competition brief is located.

In addition to visiting the competition site, students tour masonry buildings in the city and architecture related to the competition. This year, 60 students and faculty members who teach the students toured Manhattan Feb. 2-3, with relevant stops at the Morgan Library, the Neue Galerie and the Richard Gilder Center at the American Museum of Natural History, which will inform student entries.

The competition requires students to design a multi-storied building in an urban setting with a particular focus on using concrete block. Williams will be the chief juror for the competition with Odom, Laia Celma, assistant teaching professor of architecture, and Logan Myers, vice president of marketing and sales at Beavertown Block and the local representative of the Concrete Masonry and Hardscapes Association, rounding out the jury. The jury will set specific criteria for awarding cash prizes to the winners.

NCMA funding is also used to support the chief juror, and this lecture.

Competition entries will be displayed in the Stuckeman Jury Space on April 18, and the jury will work in a closed session on April 19 to determine winners, which will be announced at 1:30 p.m.