Skip to Content

Carleton Architecture Students Recognized in International Bauhaus Campus Architecture Competition

Two undergraduate students from the Azrieli School of Architecture & Urbanism have won recognition in an international competition to reimagine the famous Bauhaus school in Dessau, Germany.

The Bauhaus Campus 2021 Architecture Competition for Students took place between November 2020 and May 2021, attracting 1,795 participants and 388 projects from 82 countries.

Bennet Harvey was one of 10 entrants to receive an Honourable Mention. His project, A Space for Sustainable Renaissance, aims to offer students “a unique atmosphere for sustainable teachings.”

The six-member jury praised the project’s completeness. “This campus aims not only to be sustainable but also to become an educational tool in itself, both for the campus residents and the people of Dessau.”

The jury also named Noah Desjardins as one of 39 finalists. His project, Sustained Illumination, has a polycarbonate curtain wall that brings lighting levels to a higher level and reduces the dependency on electrical power.

Harvey and Desjardins developed the projects in the third-year Global DSA Virtual Studio, led by Associate Professor Manuel Baez. The studio took on the design challenge offered by the competition. Baez asked the students to reflect upon their recent and ongoing experience due to the COVID-19 pandemic, other critical concerns, and their cumulative educational experience since they entered the architecture program.

“I’m delighted with the projects from all of the students for the Virtual DSA Studio and congratulate Bennet Harvey and Noah Desjardins for their successful projects,” says Baez.

“The critical and disruptive time in history that we are going through from an environmental, social, and cultural perspective call for the type of all-encompassing radical rethinking that the original Bauhaus offered the world,” he says. “This competition studio offered an opportunity for the students to address these current concerns and to propose how this can be addressed through educational institutions and practice.”

A Space for Sustainable Renaissance

Bennet Harvey

Honourable Mention

Project Statement

In just 13 years, it is estimated that the number of people in the consumer class will increase by over two billion people. In this regard, it becomes important to educate the designers of the future in ways of sustainable design and living.

Heavy timber construction alongside rammed earth was chosen as the main building materials for the project, minimizing CO2 emissions through construction and maximizing CO2 sequestered. ETFE is also used, giving hierarchy through material to the exhibition space and greenhouse.

The placement of the project in the southwest corner of the site allows for a landscape to be fabricated in the remaining area, marking a disconnect between the city and the project. A greenhouse allows for teachings into sustainable farming and for a community garden and farmer markets to be hosted in the shared space between the classes and exhibition.

Select dorms are inserted into the fabricated landscape for students or teachers in conversation with the greenhouse. The addition of boardwalks to the landscape allows for potential future growth.

Jury Comments

The jury valued the completeness of this architectural project as a whole. It doesn’t hide its intention to become a reference in sustainability, a topic that is among the greatest challenges that architecture is facing these days. This campus aims not only to be sustainable but also to become an educational tool in itself, both for the campus residents and the people of Dessau.

The project does not address sustainability by simply covering a regular building in solar panels or other elements which might help it become more sustainable. It takes sustainability and makes it the essence of the campus and the project, making it a key variable in every decision taken — from the treatment of the site to the materials used, such as wood (which is locally available in Germany) and compacted earth (which could be taken from the excavation required to build the pond.