Open to students and professionals worldwide, the Architecture at Zero 2013 competition is challenging participants to create a design for a new, roughly 150 unit mixed-use residential apartment building located in the Tenderloin neighborhood in San Francisco, California. With the aim of being as close to zero net energy as possible, the building must be a mix of affordable and market rate housing units and include a full neighborhood-serving grocery store on the ground level. The competition is presented by Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and AIA San Francisco, in partnership with the Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation (TNDC). Submissions are due October 1. To register, and for more information, please visit here.

Ground/Work is a design competition just launched yesterday that seeks to recognize emerging design talent with a highly visible built project in New York City for Van Alen Institute. Since 1982, the Institute has occupied the sixth floor of its building at 30 West 22nd Street in Manhattan, where a diverse program of competitions, curatorial initiatives, and public events has made Van Alen an influential center for design innovation. This year, the Institute is making its public-oriented mission central to the reinvention of its own office and event space, transforming the ground floor and lower level of its building for a new venue to house its entire work space and public programs. The deadline for submissions is June 13. For more information, please visit here.

The Department of State’s Bureau of Overseas Buildings Operations (OBO) has shortlisted four design firms for the major rehabilitation of the Athens Chancery project. Protected as an architectural landmark, the mid-century modern building was originally designed by the famed Bauhaus architect Walter Gropius with the consulting architect Pericles A. Sakellarios.

Transform Kansas City, a collaboration between the Kansas City Regional Transit Alliance and the Kansas City Chapter of the American Institute of Architects Young Architects Forum, is asking for submissions that illustrate transportation related or affected ideas or solutions. No matter your background or experience, all are being called to submit your ideas on transportation, urban design and architecture. You are encouraged to find solutions to question such as: What impact does urban mass transit have on the mobility of our cities in which we live, work and play? What forms will these new investments take and what is the result to our built environment? The deadline for submissions is June 30. For more information, please visit here.

Floornature recently launched Next Landmark 2013, their second international contest for young architects, which is introducing a new category dedicated to architecture photography and taking the winners to Helsinki Design Week. The competition is organized to spotlight and showcase projects by the new generations of architects, promoting what they are doing or planning for contemporary living. Furthermore, it provides an ethical opportunity with a declared interest in the community, helping up-and-coming architects move forward in their careers. Originality, environmental sustainability and all the ideas that exploit relations between people, architecture and landscape will be the main contents of the winning projects and research essays. The deadline for entries is June 30. For more information, please visit here.

The Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute and the Make It Right Foundation have issued a $250,000 challenge for manufacturers to design a product for the affordable housing market, which is both safe for human and environmental health and is designed for re-use. The deadline for submissions is June 30, 2013.

Update: Our friends at Two Islands have launched a Kickstarter campaing so you could also be part of the project. By pledging £5, you can have your own photo used in the ceiling of Mark's House (or £20 for a bigger one). You can send a photo, a sign, a collage or even a QR code, so get creative! Click here for all the information.

Entries are now being accepted for “Your World, Reimagined: A Global Design Competition.”

With the theme of 'Urban by Nature', the sixth edition of the International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam opens in May 2014 in the Kunsthal in Rotterdam. With Dutch landscape architect Dirk Sijmons as the curator, IABR is calling for best practices from all over the world to support and substantiate the Biennale’s main exhibition’s narrative. Prospective participants who have designed or are designing concrete projects that deal with the relationship between man, nature and city, are invited to submit their applications by June 9, 2013. For more information, please visit here.

Last year the University of California, Davis invited three architects to compete for the chance to design their new $30 million art museum, slated to open in 2016. The competition was a design-build affair, with each entrant being asked to pair up with a contractor and submit a holistic design. For those who missed it, SO - IL were announced as the winners of the competition.

The extensive damage to low-lying waterfront zones caused by Hurricane Sandy in October 2012 reinforced the need for resilient infrastructure and redevelopment strategies for existing coastal communities throughout the greater New York area. Costly damage to buildings, roads, and utility systems by the storm raises the controversial question of whether areas of particular geographic vulnerability should be rebuilt, maintained and defended, or simply abandoned. In an effort to solicit creative ideas, the FAR ROC [For a Resilient Rockaway] competition seeks innovative proposals for the design and development of a comprehensive new master plan for Arverne East, a vacant 80+ acre Urban Renewal site on the Rockaway Peninsula in New York City. Submissions are due no later than June 14. For more information, please visit here.

Officially launched this month by Strelka Institute for Media Architecture and Design, the International Competition for Zaryadye Park in Moscow, Russia is challenging participants to develop an Architecture and Landscaping Design Concept that will form the basis for the creation of a contemporary Park with a high quality infrastructure that will be open for the public all year round. Zaryadye is a unique historic district in downtown Moscow, and after the demolition of Hotel Russia, the site has remained abandoned for over 6 years. In late January, 2012, Prime Minister and President-Elect Vladimir Putin proposed to turn this 130 000 sq. m area into a multi-functional public park. The deadline for submissions is May 22. For more information, please visit here.

Videos

Madrid-based architect Angel Borrego Cubero of Office for Strategic Spaces (OSS) has directed and produced the first documentary focused on the tense process that characterizes an architectural competition. Appropriately titled The Competition, the film captures a fascinating account on how five world renowned architects - Jean Nouvel, Frank Gehry, Dominique Perrault, Zaha Hadid and Norman Foster - “toil, struggle and strategize to beat the competition.” The premise is based on a nearly forgotten, 2008 competition for a new National Museum of Art of Andorra, a small Pyrenees country nestled between Spain and France, which has yet to be realized.

Jacques Rougerie, a famous French Sea oriented architect, had the chance during his career to receive help and support from those who believed in his talent. Open to everyone, his foundation, the Jacques Rougerie Foundation, has launched an International Competition which aspires to offer a unique opportunity for students in architecture, engineering or design, from all around the world to make their projects come true, or simply to reward their creativity. The competition aims to reward the most innovative, creative and bold projects at the service of architectural innovation, relative to topics that are dear to the foundation; Water and Space. The deadline for entries is May 28. For more information, please visit here.

On the occasion of MADE expo Milano Architettura Design Edilizia, set to take place at the Milan Fairgrounds at the beginning of October, Federlegno Arredo S.r.l. is promoting the Instant House @ School competition to find the most novel projects for residential cityscapes and urban society. With the focus on kindergartens or nursery schools, and open to Italians and non-Italians who are studying or have studied architecture, engineering and industrial design, the compeition asks for architectural ideas relating to the many ways that children perceive and interpret the world around them through the multi-sensory experience of space and architecture. The deadline for entries is June 3. For more information, and for the complete competition brief, please visit here.

Building Trust international just launched 'PLAYscapes', an international design competition that challenges professional and student architects, designers, engineers and artists to find exciting design proposals to transform neglected parts of cities into interactive landscapes, encouraging public engagement, community involvement and sustainable adaptive reuse. Proposals should be sited in an abandoned or forgotten urban site and develop PLAYscapes that create opportunity for interaction and play for citizens of all ages. Submissions are due July 29. To register, and for more information, please visit here.

Aiming to build awareness of urban design solutions capable of shaping Dallas forward, The Connected City Design Challenge is asking participants to develop a more refined and specific strategy for connecting the downtown and river, and assist in securing future public and private investment. By empowering both designers and citizens, The Challenge will work to realize integrated solutions that improve the livability and viability of our city. In order to secure the most capable design talent and facilitate a variety of solutions, this will be structured as a competitive process consisting of two idea streams: a professional stream and an open stream. Requests for qualifications are due May 9 for the professional stream and for the open stream, the deadline for submissions is October 3. For more information, please visit here.

This unconventional stack of shifting floor plates forms what will soon be a new, 36-unit apartment block in French city of Montpellier. City officials released the news this week, naming Farshid Moussavi Architecture as winner of the Jardins de la Lironde competition.