Four interdisciplinary teams competed March 21-23 for the 2014 Witters Competition. The 48-hour design charrette was led by Tom Smith, SoA senior lecturer, and Ravi Srinivasan, BCN assistant professor.
The project challenge was to develop a proposal for a mixed use, housing project in the downtown area of Gainesville. The proposal would provide a viable alternative development project in comparison to the single-family housing or apartment living buildings that currently make up the area. The challenge also tasked the teams to develop structures that met the Living Building Guidelines (LBC) which includes site, water, energy, health, materials, equity and beauty.
This year’s winning team was Lawrence Zeng, LAE, Alexandra Fasshauer, ARCH, Julie Emminger, IND, and Bethany Mayhew, ARCH. This team was the smallest of the four teams that competed which worked to their advantage.
Of the four students, one had competed in the Witters Competition before. “This experience has been extremely positive for me,” says Emminger. “Working in small interdisciplinary teams brings out the creativity in all of us. This is true collaboration and allows us to build holistically, as everyone gets to contribute.”
When asked what advice to give to future Witters Competition team members, Fasshauer says to definitely get involved with the competition and take advantage of working with students from other disciplines. “Seeing what we could produce in a short amount of time made us realize what we are capable of when working in an interdisciplinary team,” states Fasshauer. “We continued to stay open-minded throughout the process and allowed everyone to contribute ideas and thoughts.”
Established in 1993, the Witters Competition is endowed by Arthur G. and Beverley A. Witters for a college-wide interdisciplinary academic competition to foster better understanding among design, construction and planning students.
Pictured above from left to right: Lawrence Zeng, Alexandra Fasshaurer, Julie Emminger and Bethany Mayhew.