At a recent event at the Contemporary Art Institute of Detroit (CAID), Taubman College graduate students Mary Martin, Aggie Drelich and Kwang Seok Oh received honors for their submissions to the 2008 Detroit Eco-Village Student Competition.

Sponsored by the City of Detroit and WARM Training Center, the ideas competition invited students to design a proto-typical, mixed-income development on a 5-acre site in Detroit’s Woodbridge neighborhood and was intended to generate fresh ideas for sustainable neighborhood design. One studio from each accredited school of architecture in Southeastern Michigan (University of Michigan, Lawrence Technological University and University of Detroit Mercy) participated in the competition. The participating studio from Taubman College was taught by Lecturer in Architecture Joel T. Schmidt.

Mary Martin, Aggie Drelich and Kwang Seok Oh received recognition and prizes for their projects entitled MMAD Housing and Mixed Greens.

MMAD Housing by Mary Martin and Aggie Drelich was singled-out by the jury’s chairman, Teddy Cruz of Estudio Teddy Cruz, San Diego, as exhibiting the most comprehensive vision for the eco-village. The jury commended the project’s integration of sustainable design principles across scales and was particularly fond of the team’s decision to arrange seasonal vegetable gardens and kitchens into a new public realm.

Mixed Greens by Kwang Seok Oh, was commended for its development of a dense, sustainable urban cluster. The jury especially appreciated the use of permeable surfaces in and around the complex and the strong, yet penetrable massing which accommodated passive and active solar design strategies.

These projects and those of other competition participants are on display at CAID throughout the summer. CAID is located in the Woodbridge Historic District three blocks west of the Wayne State University Campus. Visit http://www.thecaid.org for more information.