Field of dreams

Previous competitions for the Burnham Prize, sponsored every two years by the Chicago Architectural Club, have imagined grand urban gestures—a gateway to Millennium Park, or a repurposing of the downtown riverfront. A neat confluence of forces has given CAC an opportunity to diminish the grandiosity factor in the 2006 version.

The earthier idea had its germination with the Lawndale Heritage Project, which approached the Chicago Architecture Foundation about helping with a program that would draw attention to its Graystone Initiative (the area is flush with the early-20th-century housing). The foundation had already planned to mount an exhibition in the fall of 2006 about Lawndale’s past, present and future; foundation curator Ned Cramer asked CAC to handle the “future” component by focusing the Burnham Prize on ideas to fill in the glut of empty lots in the West Side district with a noble history and rich architectural fabric. The program called for pragmatic solutions to community needs: affordable housing and gathering places for group activities.

Public showings of the visionary ideas submitted in design competitions help create an excellent climate for discussion about the built environment. But generally, the public has a hard time reading the kinds of plans and drawings that architects make to illustrate their ideas—a situation amply reflected in the projects exhibited at the Homan Square Community Center. It’s no real surprise, then, that the “People’s Choice” winner among the finalists (visitors to the center were allowed to vote on their favorite; the other four were chosen by a jury composed of architects and community residents) is the project that’s easiest to read. For “Greenhouse/Green House,” designers Shinya Uehara and Chantelle Brewer propose a housing prototype that envelops a house on a standard Chicago lot with a greenhouse. While most likely an impractical notion, its visual appeal is palpable—and immediately understood from the presentation boards.

Probably the most ambitious and audacious idea comes from Chicagoans Michael McAtee and Stephen Lee. Nearly all the entries include an area map of Lawndale showing all the vacant lots. Many of the blocks look like dental X-rays with a lot of missing teeth, evidently inspiring McAtee and Lee to suggest an “Urban Ecotone,” relocating intact buildings to infill sites on broken blocks. You can envision the project by imagining the area transformed like a game of Tetris. The resulting open spaces could then be returned to their natural prairie form.

Between now and the fall, when the foundation’s “Learning from North Lawndale” show opens, the finalists will develop the ideas further. Another jury will determine which entry will win the Burnham Prize itself—a three-month stipend for study in Rome, which for the kind of architect who enters competitions such as this one (i.e., young and often unemployed) is about as good as it gets.—Philip Berger

Projects by Burnham Prize finalists are on exhibit at the Homan Square Community Center through Saturday 25. The presentation boards can be seen at www.chicagoarchitecturalclub.org.