The Architect’s Newspaper: Happy Friday! It’s been another busy week in the news, so AN’s editors have rounded up a few assorted items that you may have missed. For those living in the Northeast, this weekend, as you’ve probably heard, marks the 10th anniversary of the date when hurricane-turned-superstorm Sandy pummeled the region with high winds and catastrophic storm surge. A decade later, many coastal communities, New York City included, are continuing the recovery and rebuilding process. In New York, the lead-up to the Sandy 10-year has been filled with special public programming focused on how far we’ve come since the storm and how much farther we need to go as climate change–exacerbated natural disasters continue to pose a threat to vulnerable communities.

New-York Historic Society announces archiving of Hurricane Sandy Design Competition

The New-York Historical Society is publicly releasing the archives of the Rebuild by Design Hurricane Sandy Design Competition in observation of the 10th anniversary of an extreme weather event that ravaged America’s most-populous city (along with large swaths of the coastal Northeast), forcing leaders to take a long hard look at how resiliency-focused design can be deployed to safeguard its citizens from future storms. Two projects stemming from the competition that are now being implemented include SCAPE’s Living Breakwaters and Bjarke Ingels Group’s BIG U.

Launched by President Obama’s Hurricane Sandy Rebuilding Task Force, the multi-stage competition “coupled innovation and global expertise with community insight to develop implementable solutions to the region’s most complex needs,” per the New-York Historical Society. The catalytic competition, which led to the formation of Rebuild by Design as a standalone organization, was led in partnership by a range of organization including the U.S. Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Municipal Art Society, Regional Plan Association, NYU’s Institute for Public Knowledge, and The Van Alen Institute, with support from The Rockefeller Foundation and other philanthropic partners. Read More >>