Do you have the next great idea for a groundbreaking technology, model shop or building that could potentially revolutionize the future of the steel design and construction industry? Enter AISC's first-ever Future of Steel competition! The competition rewards and celebrates innovative ideas for the future of structural steel fabrication, erection, engineering, design and construction. And you have the opportunity to win one of three cash prizes, totaling $2,000!
The first-place winner of the competition will receive a grand prize of $1,000 cash; the second-place winner will receive a $500 cash prize; and two third-place winners will receive a $250 cash prize. In addition, the winning designs and runners-up will be displayed at the 2014 NASCC: The Steel Conference, March 26-29 in Toronto. Designs may also be selected to be featured in Modern Steel Construction magazine.
"What makes this competition truly fantastic is that there are no rules," said Carly Hurd, AISC director of membership services. "AISC is looking for design concepts for innovations that haven't been realized yet by the steel design and construction industry. We believe that the future of the industry lies in the areas of innovation, which is driven by great ideas. Let your inner visionary and inventor shine; the sky's the limit!"
The only requirement is that designs and graphics be sent electronically. All images should be 300-dpi JPEG, TIFF or ESP files, preferably 4 in. by 6 in. or larger. Please do not embed photographs or figures in a Microsoft Word document (or any other type) unless you have also included separate image files. AutoCAD files cannot be used; submit structural details as line drawings or high-resolution PDFs.
Competition entries can be submitted by an individual or a team. Please also include a title for your innovation and a brief description with your entry, as well as the entrant's name(s) and/or company. All submissions represent that the entrant grants AISC an irrevocable, world-wide, paid-in-full license to publish (in both print and electronic form) all of the designs, images, drawings, graphics or electronic files provided by the entrant.
Please email your competition entries to AISC's Carly Hurd at hurd@aisc.org by October 1, 2013, and label the subject line: "Future of Steel Competition." All of the entries will then be posted publicly to AISC's Facebook page at www.facebook.com/AISCdotORG, where they'll be voted on fans. The three entries that receive the most votes will be crowned the winners.
For questions about the competition, please contact AISC's Carly Hurd at hurd@aisc.org.
About the American Institute of Steel Construction
The American Institute of Steel Construction, headquartered in Chicago, is a not-for-profit technical institute and trade association established in 1921 to serve the structural steel design community and construction industry. AISC's mission is to make structural steel the material of choice by being the leader in structural steel-related technical and market-building activities, including: specification and code development, research, education, technical assistance, quality certification, standardization, and market development. AISC has a long tradition of service to the steel construction industry of providing timely and reliable information.
Related Stories
| Oct 13, 2010
County building aims for the sun, shade
The 187,032-sf East County Hall of Justice in Dublin, Calif., will be oriented to take advantage of daylighting, with exterior sunshades preventing unwanted heat gain and glare. The building is targeting LEED Silver. Strong horizontal massing helps both buildings better match their low-rise and residential neighbors.
| Oct 12, 2010
Holton Career and Resource Center, Durham, N.C.
27th Annual Reconstruction Awards—Special Recognition. Early in the current decade, violence within the community of Northeast Central Durham, N.C., escalated to the point where school safety officers at Holton Junior High School feared for their own safety. The school eventually closed and the property sat vacant for five years.
| Oct 12, 2010
Guardian Building, Detroit, Mich.
27th Annual Reconstruction Awards—Special Recognition. The relocation and consolidation of hundreds of employees from seven departments of Wayne County, Mich., into the historic Guardian Building in downtown Detroit is a refreshing tale of smart government planning and clever financial management that will benefit taxpayers in the economically distressed region for years to come.
| Oct 12, 2010
Richmond CenterStage, Richmond, Va.
27th Annual Reconstruction Awards—Bronze Award. The Richmond CenterStage opened in 1928 in the Virginia capital as a grand movie palace named Loew’s Theatre. It was reinvented in 1983 as a performing arts center known as Carpenter Theatre and hobbled along until 2004, when the crumbling venue was mercifully shuttered.
| Oct 12, 2010
University of Toledo, Memorial Field House
27th Annual Reconstruction Awards—Silver Award. Memorial Field House, once the lovely Collegiate Gothic (ca. 1933) centerpiece (along with neighboring University Hall) of the University of Toledo campus, took its share of abuse after a new athletic arena made it redundant, in 1976. The ultimate insult occurred when the ROTC used it as a paintball venue.
| Oct 12, 2010
Owen Hall, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Mich.
27th Annual Reconstruction Awards—Silver Award. Officials at Michigan State University’s East Lansing Campus were concerned that Owen Hall, a mid-20th-century residence facility, was no longer attracting much interest from its target audience, graduate and international students.
| Oct 12, 2010
Gartner Auditorium, Cleveland Museum of Art
27th Annual Reconstruction Awards—Silver Award. Gartner Auditorium was originally designed by Marcel Breuer and completed, in 1971, as part of his Education Wing at the Cleveland Museum of Art. Despite that lofty provenance, the Gartner was never a perfect music venue.
| Oct 12, 2010
Cell and Genome Sciences Building, Farmington, Conn.
27th Annual Reconstruction Awards—Silver Award. Administrators at the University of Connecticut Health Center in Farmington didn’t think much of the 1970s building they planned to turn into the school’s Cell and Genome Sciences Building. It’s not that the former toxicology research facility was in such terrible shape, but the 117,800-sf structure had almost no windows and its interior was dark and chopped up.
| Oct 12, 2010
The Watch Factory, Waltham, Mass.
27th Annual Reconstruction Awards — Gold Award. When the Boston Watch Company opened its factory in 1854 on the banks of the Charles River in Waltham, Mass., the area was far enough away from the dust, dirt, and grime of Boston to safely assemble delicate watch parts.
| Oct 12, 2010
Cuyahoga County Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument, Cleveland, Ohio
27th Annual Reconstruction Awards—Gold Award. The Cuyahoga County Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument was dedicated on the Fourth of July, 1894, to honor the memory of the more than 9,000 Cuyahoga County veterans of the Civil War.