RED

Gerald Hine's ULI 2010 Competition

April 8th marked the end of 2010 Urban Land Institute (ULI) Gerald Hines Student Urban Design Competition in San Diego, California.  Members from the Real Estate Club, Macy Leung and Ignacio Correa, along with Harvard GSD students Fai Au, Phyllis Xue Zhou, and HBS student Shane Campbell, competed in the ULI national finalists competition against students from the University of Pennsylvania, University of Maryland, and North Carolina State University/University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (this year’s winning team) for the national title and $50,000.

The competition began in January, with an initial phase of two weeks. While some schools, like Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania, originally had 10-20 individual team entries submitted from each school,  other schools, such as University of Maryland, chose only one team for the competition.  There were a total of 137 teams, and after advancing to the finalists stage, the final four had to competed in an oral presentation in San Diego on April 7th and April 8th.

Harvard’s proposal for this year’s competition is titled “Celebration of Arts”, which consists of a mixed-use residential/retail development, a central art galleria, a man-made canal, and art-themed parks throughout the site.  The 73 acre redevelopment scheme aims to celebrate the North end of a trolley station on the site, Park Boulevard and Broadway Street, and provide linkage from nearby parks and neighborhoods to the waterfront.  In addition, the proposal aims to revitalize the neighborhood and use it as a catalytic development to influence the rest of the San Diego region.

Team Members:

Macy Man-Sai Leung (Team Leader – Architecture/Economics/Urban Design);   Ignacio Correa (Urban Design/Masterplanning/Real Estate);    Fai Au (Architecture/Technology);    Phyllis Xue Zhou (Landscape Architecture/Arts);    Shane Campbell (MBA/Engineering).

Official Team Advisors:

Professor Richard Peiser (Michael D. Spear Professor of  Real Estate and Development at Harvard University Graduate School of Design);  Brian Canin (Principal of Canin Associates)

Harvard Team (Left to Right: Fai Au, Ignacio Correa, Macy Leung, Phyllis Xue Zhou, Shane Campbell)

Graduate School of Design Late Night Group Meeting

We received news in February that our team had advanced to the finalist stage, and we had one month to further develop our original scheme in addition to revising the proforma.  We had to submit four additional boards in addition to the original six, and prepare a business plan and a powerpoint presentation.  We worked feverishly together despite everyone’s busy schedule, up until the final hours before we flew out to San Diego for our presentation.

Our team arrived in San Diego on the morning of April 7th – everyone was working on the presentation speech/business plan/graphics on the airplane, then we immediately went to Hotel Indigo for a mock presentation.  Undaunted by the lack of sleep and time zone change, our team practiced a few more times in the hotel room, re-wrote our speeches, and handled some last-minute printing in San Diego (UPenn/Maryland also printed on site) before joining the rest of our competitors for dinner at the hotel terrace.

Mock Presentation Day at Hotel Indigo

On the day of the presentation, each team had to draw to determine the order of presentation at the Museum of Contemporary Arts.  Our team met at 6:00am in our hotel room to do another practice presentation before venturing to the presentation site.  North Carolina went first, followed by Maryland, then Harvard and UPenn last.  With two hours in between breakfast and our presentation, our team ventured to the nearby outdoor plaza to practice two more times, before some of us got coffee/took power naps from the lack of sleep in the past few days.  Needless to say, everyone did a great job and gave an excellent presentation to the jury and audience.  We were allotted 25 minutes to present, and 20 minutes for QandA.  I opened with the introduction and concepts, followed by Ignacio detailing the masterplan, Fai with the architectural typology, Phyllis with landscape, and Shane with the numbers.  Our presentation was very well received, and we walked away with a sense of relief, feeling a job well done, and waited anxiously for the result.

Jury

Macy Leung

Ignacio Correa

Fai Au

Phyllis Xue Zhou

Shane Campbell

Presentation

Jury Panel

Questions and Answers

San Diego, Museum of Contemporary Arts

For official ULI press release and Harvard team’s competition entries:

http://udcompetition.uli.org/finalists

http://udcompetition.uli.org/

Several members of the RED club (Joseph Martinez, Arianna Sacks, Matt Elley, Ignacio Correa, Perry Lubin, Lester Yu, Helen Jung, Rodger Du, Susan Cutler, and Shilpa Ahuja) attended a project management course over Spring Break in Bilbao. The class focused on the conceptualization, design, engineering, and construction of the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao. We met at the office of IDOM, the executive architect, project manager, and construction manager of the museum. The senior project manager and executive architect of record were both present for our discussions, as well as Professor Spiro Pollalis, who facilitated the course.

What an amazing trip it was! While the majority of the class consisted of late nights working on presentations for the following day, we got to see how this project has truly catalyzed development in Bilbao, and hear some fantastic stories about how all of the stakeholders came together (Frank Gehry, IDOM, and the Consortium of the Guggenheim Museum) to create such a unique project.

There were some great takeaways on how to work with a internationally recognized architect, a public client, and manage multiple general contractors simultaneously. Another great lesson was the way that good architecture can create real estate value. The level of private investment around the museum is amazing, with a new shopping mall, office tower, and residential spaces coming online.

On the last day, we got to spend some time visiting some other famous works of modern architecture in the region: The Marques de Riscal Winery by Gehry, the Ysios Winery by Santiago Calatrava, and the López de Heredia Winery by Zaha Hadid. Notice anything in common with the three projects mentioned? To say it was a great time is an understatement. Our class really bonded over the course of this trip. This class goes to show that you can enjoy yourselves while learning a lot at the same time!

Our club is proud to announce that RED club members Ignacio Correa and Macy Leung along with GSD students Fai Au and Xue Zhou have entered into the finalist round for the ULI Gerald Hines Urban Design Competition! They are now competing with three other teams for a $50,000 prize. The remaining teams will receive $10,000 each. The team was advised by Professor Richard Peiser.

From the press release on the ULI Gerald Hines Competition Website:

Harvard University: “Celebration of Art” proposes an art-centric, multi-generational, European-scaled, sustainable development on the site of a former warehouse district. The project seeks to create over 1,500 jobs while attracting people to live, shop, and work in East Village. The design is unified by a central park and subdivided by four art-themed sub districts, each with its own art-themed pocket park. Team members include Macy Man-Sai Leung, Ignacio Correa, Fai Au, Xue Zhou, and Shane Campbell. The team is advised by Richard Peiser and Brian Canin.

Click here to download the ULI Competition Submission (PDF)

Members of the GSD Real Estate club were present at the 2009 Urban Land Institute Fall Conference in San Francisco.

One session was on brownfield redevelopment, with a case study on Visitacion Valley in San Francisco. Another session detailed strategies for dealing with distressed assets. A particularly interesting session entailed the greening of the Empire State Building as part of the $550million capital improvement program being undertaken by Jones Lang LaSalle.

The session on workforce housing detailed out projects in Colorado and South Carolina. In the case of the South Carolina project, a contribution of the land as equity on the deal made significant inroads towards bridging the gap between development cost and the sales price on an affordable unit.

Susan Cutler and Helen Jung

Jung Min Hong, Susan Cutler, Helen Jung, and Joe Martinez

A model showing the Transbay Terminal development in San Francisco

The Harvard Real Estate Development Club (RED) is a student group for members of the Harvard community interested in real estate and urban development issues. A primary objective is to strengthen the relationship between faculty, students and practitioners interested in development issues. The RED Club provides a forum for ongoing dialogue with experts, leading professionals in the field and practitioners. Activities include sponsoring speakers from the real estate professional community.

Members are interested in various aspects of development, including real estate finance, public/private ventures, architectural design, international development, urban design and environmental planning. The RED Club is formed primarily by students from Harvard Design School, but is also open to members of the Harvard Business School, Harvard Kennedy School of Government and Harvard Law School.

Harvard University prepares graduates for careers in real estate development, finance and other private and public sector positions in urban development. It emphasizes analytical skills, decision-making, development processes, political, environmental, legal, and general urban context knowledge.