The winner of this year’s prestigious 2011 Solar Decathlon was announced over the weekend.

Last month we reported on the 2011 Solar Decathlon. It’s an extremely important event in the sustainable architecture community, like the Olympics/Eurovision of solar design, bringing together collaborative teams from universities all over the world.

Over the weekend, the winner was announced.

Out of the 18 prefab homes competing in this year’s Solar Decathlon, the team with the prettiest, most cost-effective and energy-efficient house is…

WaterShed from the University of Maryland!

Maryland’s WaterShed house also took first place in the architecture contest and scored in the top five in almost every other contest, including engineering and market appeal. The design was inspired by the beloved Chesapeake Bay ecosystem, harnessing the power of the sun’s energy with a particular focus on water, specifically harvesting, recycling and reusing it.

Philosophically, the house is meant to serve as a model of how architecture can help preserve watersheds while “harmonizing modernity, tradition, and simple building strategies,” per the team’s website.

Structurally the house is built as two “shed” or butterfly modules connected by a small middle bit, referred to as a hyphen. The two larger modules serve as the public and private realms of the house, with the bathroom tucked in between.

Storm water runoff is collected on the roof and directed to a water axis at the core of the house.

With an interior space of 900 square feet, the exterior features composting, an edible garden and a vertical wall.

A solar thermal panel lines the back of the house, which heats water for domestic use.

A graphic illustrating how water is collected and directed to the core of the house.

For a list of all the winners, visit the official tally.

Images: US Dept. of Energy; UMD Watershed on Flickr; UMD Watershed

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Students are once again vying to design and build the most cost-effective, energy-efficient and prettiest solar-powered home.

Two must-sees in Washington, DC this fall: one, the newly unveiled (though not officially dedicated due to hurricane upset) monument to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., designed by Chinese sculptor Master Lei Yixin. The other, the U.S. Department of Energy’s Solar Decathlon installation on the National Mall, from September 23-October 2, 2011.

The Decathlon is an award-winning collaborative program that engages teams from colleges across the world to design, build, and operate solar-powered houses that are cost-effective, energy-efficient, and pretty. The winner is the team that does it best, mindfully creating according to affordability, consumer appeal, and design excellence. It’s a free biennial event totally open to the public, who get to tour homes fathomed in nearby Maryland and as far imagined as New Zealand.

The purpose of the event is to educate student participants and the public at large about using clean-energy, the cost-effectiveness of energy-efficient construction and appliances, and providing students with training for the clean-energy workforce. Since 2002, the first year of the event, 72 houses have competed. Those houses are now dotted throughout the United States and the world serving educational, conservation, and community-oriented functions.

This year, nineteen teams are competing from the United States, Belgium, Canada, China and New Zealand. Here are a few we’re keeping our eye on.

From Middlebury College, “Self-Reliance.” A two-bedroom, 990-ft2 house designed for a family of four.

“First Light,” from Victoria University of Wellington, inspired by the traditional New Zealand holiday home—the “Kiwi bach.”

From the University of Maryland “WaterShed” proposes solutions to water and energy shortages.

CHIP from SCI-Arc is a design motivated by California’s “soaring land costs and urban sprawl.” It’s meant to be a minimal-footprint, affordable dwelling that offers a solution to the challenges of home ownership.

Out of Belgium, Ghent University’s E-Cube aims for simplicity stripped of nonessential components and finishes.

Visit Solar Decathlon for a full list of the participating teams, and tell us…what’s your favorite?

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Dream all you want, you’re never going to live in Barbie’s eco-friendly mansion.

The winning design of the American Institute of Architects’ Barbie Dream House competition (really) is a four-story, eco-friendly Malibu mansion with pink sliding doors. Too bad Barbie and Jen (as in Aniston) are the only gals who can afford to live there.

The green manse features 1,500 square feet of entertaining space, an open chef’s kitchen, separate library and client-meeting room, an “inspiration room” floor, rooftop greenhouse, and a landscaped garden for her assortment of exotic pets. True, the last time we checked the giraffe on her lawn was listed as an endangered species, but not only is Barbie an architect you see, she’s evidently a world-renowned zoologist as well.

Philosophically speaking, 21^st century Barbie is like Lara Croft and Richard Branson rolled into one.

Barbie’s eco-manor also features solar panels, bamboo flooring, low-flow fixtures, and locally sourced materials. Recent Harvard grads Ting Li and Maja Paklar created the design, which is in line with the principles set forth by U.S. Green Building Council, while remaining “true to all the needs of a classic California girl,” the pair adds.

The AIA created the competition as a way of promoting Barbie’s latest career move on the glass escalator that is the “I Can Be…” series, which aims to inspire girls to be anything they want to be.

I can get behind that. Who knows? Had I owned the “I Can Be a Lifeguard” doll at age four, I might have passed my treading-water-with-a-brick test at age seventeen instead of sneaking behind the pool house for some ganja.

I Can Be…Pamela Anderson

If only I’d gotten that Leeza Gibbons face-and-body transplant. I could have been an entertainment news host.

I Can Be…On Entertainment Tonight

Applying myself in the biological sciences instead of the biology of my hormones could have led to an exciting career in veterinary medicine. How sexy is that frock?

I Can Be…a naughty nurse (but only if you want me to be)

Oh well, I’ll just have to settle for a job in a call center.

I Can Be…a telemarketer

Like George Constanza, I too have fostered fantasies of becoming an employable architect. Thanks to Barbie that dream is now a reality. I just need some chunky glasses, a construction hat, and a pretty hot-pink place to store my blueprints.

Landing a job might prove difficult, however, particularly if I showed up to a job interview looking like this:

Darn you, Beetlejuice! Back to the drafting table, kids. I wonder if Barbie’s princess charm school offers a PhD program.

Fortunately for California’s coast line, Barbie’s green dream house is not set to actually break ground, or plastic, ever. It was imagined for promotional purposes only. The concept though, is sweet and the house – if you’re a zoologist/movie star/media mogul – is viably sustainable.

Though, philosophically speaking again, Barbie’s got a few more eco pit-stops to go, like trading in her Vacation Glam Jet for a stay-cation.

Images: FastCo; Barbie; The Daily Mail

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Does design have the power to change the world? AIGA, the premiere organization for professional and student designers, believes that yes, it can.

AIGA is hosting its second annual (Re)design Awards to prove that design is both a strategic tool and cultural force for transforming the way we function in the world. With the mission of “igniting change,” they’re looking for submissions in two categories: Environmental Sustainability and Social Responsibility. Stan Evenson, founder and CEO of Evenson Design Group and co-chair of the event, explains that those two categories can include anything from multimedia, interactive design, packaging and product design to brand identity, environmental design, permaculture and urban planning.

“If one’s design submission is using sustainable materials and/or promoting environmental sustainability or socially responsible actions to benefit people, it’s eligible.”

The competition runs through July 22, 2011 and is open to the international design community. Thus far, entries have come in from Greece, Australia, Canada and across the United States. All submissions will be judged by design luminaries Eric Benson, Rachel Martin, Naomi Pearson, Tim McNeil and Brain Dougherty. The winner will be honored at a special Gala event on October 27, 2011.

Design, Ever-Evolving

While infringements and frustrations abound, our collective consciousness is awakening, particularly when it comes to awareness about what we wear, how we eat, and what we buy. Design is elemental, both subtly and integrally, to the choices that we make (and have) as consumers.

“[My wife and co-chair] Tricia and I have had our design business, EDG, for over 35 years. And many of those years we were wearing blinders, encouraging our clients to print more and use more, and not stepping back for one moment to admit that we were definitely a part of an enormous problem.”

Three children later, they were “awakened” one day in 2005 with the realization that they wanted to be part of the solution. They, like so many of their colleagues, set out to revolutionize the field with sustainability in mind.

“How can we be enlightened through design,” Evenson wonders. “The (Re)design Awards are about rethinking, reengaging, reconnecting, repurposing our design. It’s about more than just creating something beautiful for a client. It’s about doing something bigger for this world. For designers, it’s a responsibility and an opportunity.”

We tried very hard to get the inside scoop on potential frontrunners and projects to watch, but to no avail. Like everyone else, we’ll have to wait. All you have to do, in the meantime, is enter.

“The deadline is impending,” Evenson warns.

(Re)designAwards 2011 from AIGA | Los Angeles on Vimeo.

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