Sponsor: NIKKEN SEKKEI LTD
  Co-sponsor: Shinkenchiku-sha Co., Ltd.   
  

 Latest information

September 1, 2019
Open this competition website.
Start accepting.

Overall Evaluation

 

Takayuki Kishii

These were highly enjoyable presentations, each of them containing great ideas. We would like to thank all the prizewinners for making preparations under the unusual circumstances of holding the screening online. The competition is in its fourth year, and this time the theme was “Public Space in the Year 20XX.” This is quite a broad theme, and I am sure narrowing it down to a specific idea was a challenge. Looking back over the competition as a whole, I feel that when considering the near future as expressed by the year “20XX,” applicants took care to focus on key concepts such as Internet-connected society, environmental issues, and aging in their proposals. While proposals followed a range of patterns, those incorporating messages about “participation” and “connection” particularly stood out.
I personally believe that an open mentality and diverse ideas will be vital as we continue to think about public space going forward. And I believe this competition represents a step toward a future in which a wide variety of people are free to participate in creating spaces for everyone.

 

Ryue Nishizawa

During this highly enjoyable session, I was pleased to see that the presenters had such diverse ideas about public space. Personally, while listening to the presentations, I had it in mind that public space ought to have “toughness” in both a physical and a conceptual sense. During the final stage, we judges found ourselves torn between two proposals, “Public On Line” (Tomohiro Fukuyama and Kuniaki Tokoro) and “Self-Sufficient City 20XX” (Kano Nomura). Nomura’s proposal involved small, independent power generators, to be linked and integrated on a village or regional level, while Fukuyama and Tokoro’s proposals dealt with connection of electrical grids from a global perspective. Although there were major differences in scale, I think that both displayed a generosity and toughness that made them viable either in the future or in the past.
In the end, the deciding factor for choosing the Fukuyama and Tokoro proposal was that the vision of people being connected to others with whom they have no ostensible relationship seemed to represent the archetypal urban experience. However, I believe it is quite possible that with a different group of judges we would have seen a different result. I have high expectations for the future success of all the prizewinners.

 

Takeshi Kito

Personally I view phenomena such as cities and public spaces, in which diverse elements are intricately intertwined, in terms of a model consisting of nodes and networks connecting them. Among the proposals we heard, there were some dealing with specific nodes that are public in nature, and others that by contrast sought to identify the public nature of the networks that connect private nodes. The proposals ranged widely, from those fusing cyber and physical aspects, such as Fukuyama and Tokoro’s first-place winning entry, to those that dealt primarily with cyberspace, and the judging process was highly enjoyable although unfortunately the public viewing was canceled due to current conditions. During the screening, I gained a renewed awareness of the importance of perspectives that prioritize interoperability in the connection of diverse things. I myself have many opportunities to consider how ecosystems should connect in the fields of Fintech (finance-technology) and data distribution, but this competition was an excellent opportunity to examine the subject anew from many different angles. I am confident that this competition helps cultivate thinkers who can effectively bring their ideas to the social implementation stage.

 

Eriko Ozaki

This was my first involvement with a competition dealing with architecture and urban spaces, and it was one surprise after another from the initial screening onward. First of all, I would like to express my great respect for all the young applicants who take an interest in urban development and who were able to express fascinating ideas like those in today’s presentations in easily understandable pictorial form. The decision on the first-place prize was extremely difficult to make. I believe that what is important, in terms of public participation in urban development, is how to make it interesting and motivate citizens to take part. Ms. Nomura’s proposal, which came quite close to winning the highest honor, was the most exciting to me and I recommended it for this reason. Not only this one, but all of the prizewinning proposals contained great ideas for making public spaces more beneficial for citizens. At this stage they are ideas on paper, and when real-world implementation is attempted, a range of practical problems may be encountered. I felt that if I could engage with these ideas myself, I would welcome the opportunity to devote my full energy to their realization.

 

Tadao Kamei

The Urban Public Space Design Competition has thus far had a variety of themes: Public Space, Sharing the In-Betweens, Shibuya-Style Public Space. This fourth edition had the theme of Public Space in the Year 20XX. I was happy to see that as the themes have become more challenging each year, there has been a corresponding increase in the variety of proposals, from hardware-oriented proposals to comprehensive urban systems. Every year, the panel includes judges who do not specialize in architecture and urban design, and this time Takeshi Kito and Eriko Ozaki offered valuable comments from multifaceted perspectives. When considering urban issues, it is vital that we listen to a range of opinions such as these. It was exciting to hear the applicants’ wonderful proposals, and personally, I felt they deepened my thinking on urban spaces. I am convinced that this competition serves as a stimulus for highly meaningful activities.