SAN FRANCISCO, CA - Home Matters, the national movement focused on raising awareness and funds to make Home a reality for all, announced the three winners of its Re-defining Home: A Design Challenge contest – the first US-wide competition that aims to address one of our nation's most critical challenges: how to create affordable homes and communities that enable every individual to thrive.
The competition, supported by the Wells Fargo Housing Foundation, the Autodesk Foundation and in partnership with San Francisco Chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIASF), challenged architects and designers to re-imagine the Home of the future and develop practical solutions to our nation's housing crisis. By introducing a bold new approach – that goes beyond shelter to community design – the Home Matters movement hopes to spark a powerful public dialogue to address one of our nation's toughest challenges: making better homes and communities for all. Research studies have shown that having an affordable, stable home and community can greatly affect one's life – from better health and educational outcomes to improved public safety, economic indicators and personal success.
The three winners were selected because their designs went beyond housing and animated the connections between housing and other important social factors of community life. The winners include:
First Place Winner: Geoff DeOld & Emily Andersen of DeOld Andersen Architecture, LLC with their project entitled "HomeWork". They received $10,000 in prize money.
Second Place Winner: Jerry Kler, A.I.A of Jerry Kler Architects with their project entitled, "Cross Pollination". He received $5,000 in prize money.
Third Place Winner: Ben Tillman, an Architectural Designer with his project entitled "New Leaf". He received $3,000 in prize money.
"The 1st Place winner did an exceptional job of designing a project called "HomeWork" which pairs home with work, providing both housing units and space for small businesses for individuals and families that need support to start or run their own business. This live work model is combined with shared amenity spaces to encourage community building, and that truly grabbed all the judges' attention," said Home Matters' CEO Dave Brown. "HomeWork" brought out fundamental ideas of the Home Matters message: that wherever you call Home in this country, it should be a safe and nurturing place to live – Geoff and his team really captured that with their design."
Emily Andersen of DeOld Andersen Architecture, LLC, on receiving the 1st place award, commented, "We entered this competition because we care about urbanism, and good housing is a key component of a good city, and affordable housing is a huge issue in many cities. Creating good urbanism means creating a mixture of uses that can eventually reinforce communities. We used this competition to test these ideas."
View the video of the winning design.