Architecture Competition Omuli Museum Of The Horse BB Student Award winners – Ion Mincu University of Architecture and Urbanism

We’d like to take the opportunity to introduce you to the Student prize winners of our “Omuli Museum Of The Horse” competition – Claudiu Zidarescu, Irena Dunda, Teodora Maria Escu and Delia Teodora Răpsigan from Romania!

Teodora Maria Escu, Irena Dunda, Delia Teodora Răpsigan and Claudiu Zidarescu

We are students at “Ion Mincu” University of Architecture and Urbanism in Bucharest, Romania and all our team members are at the end of the fourth year of studying architecture. Over time, we all collaborated with different architecture offices and participated in several architecture competitions.

What does architecture mean to you and what is the role of an architect in your society?

For us, architecture is a lifestyle, a multitude of domains with which the architect lives and works. We do not consider it a job that you do 8 hours a day and 5 days a week, but more like a way of living life, of seeing the things around us and of using what the world has to offer. It is architecture who gives the society the nourishment for its soul.

Architecture plays a big role in society, in our perspective, and it is the architect’s role to know how to use it in creating a better environment. His job is to take all of those architectural components (the technic side, the artistic side, the environmental side, the anthropological side, the legal aspects etc.), no matter how challenging the project is and get to the point of mastering it all together so he can obtain a final product worth of its surroundings and its place in the present society.

Why do you participate in architecture competitions?

Architecture competitions gave us the opportunity to gain experience and grow up professionally. We think that besides the practice that we gain from these competitions, participating in them is a good way of observing how others perceive a task and respond to the same challenge. We are always looking for different types of competitions on various subjects to gain the upper mentioned experience and get out of our comfort zone.

What advice would you give to individuals who struggle to decide whether it would be beneficial for them to participate in architecture competitions?

We would advise any person who does not know whether or not to participate in a competition to take his or her time, and find one which inspires them. It does not have to be a big competition, or on a mainstream theme, as long as it makes them want to step out of their comfort zone. This could be the best time to experiment and have fun with their own ideas without being bounded by the expectations of a client or by the school.