CEO and founder of Programming Architecture, Milos Dimcic, offers a ‘no-holds-barred’ denunciation of architecture competitions citing the different reasons why they do more harm than good to the profession of architecture.
From the subjectivity of architecture and design to the lottery nature of the competitions, Milos runs down a list reasons why the basic idea behind these contests are flawed, illustrating how, virtually, no other profession employs this methodology. He also highlights the fact that competing firms receive no remuneration for the time spent developing concepts, which as he put it, is a”waste of time”. According to Milos, this lack of remuneration also sheds a light on the discriminatory nature of the already flawed contests. Either deliberately or not, they preclude smaller practices from participating as they offer no immediate financial benefit which are of the utmost importance for these practices.
He goes on to share a quote from Rem Koolhaas on his thoughts about architectural competitions,
While the majority of projects are acquired through competitions, they are nonetheless “a form of torture,”. No other profession would be willing to be humiliated to this extent … where somebody can tell you, ‘I really respect you, I think you’re an exceptional human being, so can you collaborate or participate with 19 other architects that are similarly amazing?’— in a project where you only have a 5% chance to get the building. ”
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The video is definitely worth the watch as it offers insight into the controversial topic of architectural competitions. You can watch more of his engaging content via his youtube channel, ProArchitect.
