Six architecture students from Graz University of Technology (TU Graz) – along with two teams from Università IUAV di Venezia and Hunan University in China – won the Tongji International Construction Festival ´19 in Shanghai, China, with the design and construction of a "Pavilion with Patio" for a "Micro Community" among a total of 48 participating teams. All the teams were faced with the challenge of designing and constructing a pavilion, including an inner courtyard, for a small motley group of people on an area of three metres by four metres. Thirty polypropylene hollow web sheets measuring 150 x 150 x 0.5 centimetres were available for this purpose. High spatial quality was required.
The one-week Tongji International Construction Festival ´19 started with 13 teams from international universities, 16 teams from Tongji University and 19 other teams from all over China. Each of the 48 teams consisted of six students from the first year of architecture studies. The Graz participants were chosen on the basis of a one-day anonymous competition at the Form and Design basic seminar at the Institute of Construction and Design Principles (KOEN) of TU Graz on 7th March.
Students Stefanie Frauenthaler, Daniel Lucic, Kerstin Neuhold, Christina Radl, Markus Schmoltner and Chiara Stepanek developed the design of their pavilion in two drafting sessions on site. The winning project scored with clarity of design and quality of construction. "Our team designed the patio at the core of the pavilion, which measures 2.25 by 2.25 metres. L-shaped walls offer several possible paths through the room. The patio is at the centre and clad with red panels and open to the sky,” explains Iulius Popa from TU Graz’s Institute of Construction and Design Principles (KOEN), who supervised the students together with Wofgang List in Graz and Shanghai. “The simple construction makes very efficient use of the stiffness of the material – and the 0.75 x 0.75 metre grid means that it does not create any waste," says Popa, describing the particularly efficient planning.
TU Graz students and supervisors in front of their pavilion in Shanghai: (from left) Popa, Schmoltner, Frauenthaler, Neuhold, Radl, Stephanek, List (second row), Lucic
The team of students had been selected at TU Graz in an anonymous selection procedure at the basic seminar Form and Design in the framework of the Bachelor's degree in Architecture at TU Graz and had already travelled to Shanghai in the run-up to the competition. The students got to know the architectural highlights of Shanghai there and established contacts with students from China and other countries.
The intensive partnership between TU Graz and the Chinese Tongji University in study programmes, teaching and research means that students of the Faculty of Architecture take part in the Tongji International Construction Festival every year. The liaison office in Shanghai promotes exchange in the fields of architecture, civil engineering, mechanical engineering and electrical engineering and information technology at all levels.
