October 29, 2015
by Camila Schaulson Frenz
Our jury panel: (l-r) Mario Mohan, designer at Snøhetta; Elana Tenenbaum, associate at SHoP Architects; Sahar Moin, project designer at James Corner Field Operations; Daniel Kidd, associate at BIG – Bjarke Ingels GroupCredit: Center for Architecture
Jurors deliberate.Credit: Center for Architecture
Bricks and Beverages at the Center for ArchitectureCredit: Center for Architecture
Least Structurally Sound: Futuristic Religious Facility by Escott (Rachel Esswood and Ashleigh Talcott)Credit: Center for Architecture
The Maximalist (Best Use of Logo): Chicago Style/Deconstructivist Multifamily Residential by Pressing the Bricks (Alyssa Alumurung and Yuka Yoneda)Credit: Center for Architecture
Credit: Center for Architecture
The Wild Card: Deconstructivist Chicken Coop by Scott KearneyCredit: Center for Architecture
The Bernie Sanders Award: Ancient Greek Airport by ^^ (Justine Banda and Valeria de Jongh)Credit: Center for Architecture
Best Stylistic Interpretation: Postmodern Post Office by Mies’s Pieces (Christos Constantinou, Aditya Ghosh, Jia Kim, Jesus Morello, and Valerie Theodore)Credit: Center for Architecture
Best in Show: Ancient Egyptian Water Tower by Liar Liar Bricks on Fire (Ethan Wieselthier and Scott Strenger)Credit: Center for Architecture

In their quest to meet deadlines, architects do not get many opportunities to play at design. To lighten things up, the Center for Architecture invited young professionals to “Bricks and Beverages” on 10.16.15 for a lively game night that rekindled their love of LEGOs.

Teams pulled one building type and three architectural styles from hats (actually giant LEGO mini-figure heads) to meet a wacky design mandate. Armed with a LEGO Architecture Studio set each and sketching paper, the teams created unique LEGO masterpieces while sipping “Building Blocks,” custom cocktails designed by Eben Klemm. AIANY Emerging New York Architects Committee (ENYA) co-chair Alex Alaimo, AIA, showed off his stand-up comedy skills as the evening’s MC.

After an hour-and-a-half-long build session, jurors Daniel Kidd, associate at BIG – Bjarke Ingels Group; Mario Mohan, designer at Snøhetta; Sahar Moin, project designer at James Corner Field Operations, and Elana Tenenbaum, associate at SHoP Architects carefully deliberated to select a Best in Show and a number of category winners:

Best in Show: Ancient Egyptian Water Tower by Liar Liar Bricks on Fire (Ethan Wieselthier and Scott Strenger)

Best Stylistic Interpretation: Postmodern Post Office by Mies’s Pieces (Christos Constantinou, Aditya Ghosh, Jia Kim, Jesus Morello, and Valerie Theodore)

The Bernie Sanders Award: Ancient Greek Airport by ^^ (Justine Banda and Valeria de Jongh)

The Wild Card: Deconstructivist Chicken Coop by Scott Kearney

The Maximalist (Best Use of Logo): Chicago Style/Deconstructivist Multifamily Residential by Pressing the Bricks (Alyssa Alumurung and Yuka Yoneda)

Least Structurally Sound: Futuristic Religious Facility by Escott (Rachel Esswood and Ashleigh Talcott)

Congratulations to all our winners and thank you all for coming! We look forward to seeing you again for our next Bricks and Beverages competition!

For more images of the event, please visit our Facebook page.