MoMA and P.S.1 Announce Young Architects Program Winner

New York’s Museum of Modern Art and its affiliate P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center announced the selection of MOS as the winner of their tenth annual Young Architects Program. Each year, emerging architects compete to design an urban landscape to be installed in P.S.1’s courtyard in Long Island City,New York—the backdrop for the center’s popular Warm Up summer music series. Beating out four other finalists—!ndi Architecture, Bade Stageberg Cox, L.E.FT Architects, and PARA-project—MOS architects Hilary Sample and Michael Meredith proposed Afterparty, a concept envisioned as an “urban shelter.”

Afterparty model, copyright 2009 MOS

Afterparty will feature Bedouin tent –inspired cellular spaces under conical roofs that will not only provide shading, but a cooling breeze created by a series of chimneys, concrete water troughs, and shading of the courtyard’s existing concrete walls. “The project proposes to deal with issues of sustainability and a return to basics, working toward climate altering through passive means,” explains Barry Bergdoll, the chief curator of architecture and design at MoMA.

Afterparty model, copyright 2009 MOS

Visitors will catch glimpses of the installation even before entering the courtyard, from the surrounding streets and elevated subways, as the tall hut-like chimneys will rise well above the courtyard walls. Constructed of lightweight aluminum frames (all of which can be recycled after use), the structure will sport a dark thatched skin.

Afterparty model, copyright 2009 MOS

MOS was selected by a judging panel composed of MoMA’s director, Glenn D. Lowry; associate director, Kathy Halbreich; senior deputy director of curatorial affairs, Peter Reed; Barry Bergdoll; chief curator of media, Klaus Biesenbach; and curator of architecture and design, Andres Lepik; as well as P.S.1’s director of operations and exhibitions, Antoine Guerrero. The five finalists were short-listed from among 40 emerging architects—both established and just out of school—by outside experts in the field of architecture, ranging from practitioners and curators to educators and media.

Source: Interior Design