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Architecture students create green gardens

A design by three architecture students was chosen yesterday as the model for the University's new sustainable garden on Alexander Street and received a $1,000 award.

Graduate students Jessica Reynolds, Laila Seewang and Michael Wang created the design for the garden, which will be made from recycled materials previously used on campus. They will work with the Garden Project to fabricate garden this summer.

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The design's selection was the culmination of AdHoc, an annual competition organized by architecture graduate students Brian Ha and Ari Kardasis, that offers an opportunity for students to submit designs for a garden to be constructed on campus next summer. Twenty-one groups entered, and architecture school faculty narrowed the competition to four groups.

The Garden Project is a student-initiated program that promotes sustainably produced food. It has worked on other sustainable food initiatives, including the Forbes College garden and the Greening Princeton Farmer's Market.

In an informal discussion yesterday in Betts Auditorium, the finalists presented their designs to a panel of five judges including Ruthie Schwab '09 — who initially proposed the idea of designing the sustainable garden by competition and leads the Garden Project — and Shana Weber, the University's sustainability manager. Three guest architects were also on the panel: Margie Ruddick from WRT Design, Betsy Stoel from Scape Studio and Chris Reed from StossLU.

Designers participating in this year's competition were invited to submit plans for a sustainable garden given specific limitations. The designs were to include an entrance from the street, an area for growing plants and a cooking and eating area. Within these sections, there will be a wood-firing stove for cooking pizzas, a sculpture garden to display student art and a rose garden.

Reynolds described her group's winning design as "materials based." The proposal, she explained, included several two-layer chain link fence structures, selected to protect garden vegetation from New Jersey's abundant deer population. The group plans to insert felled trees, vegetation and other materials between the fences, she said.

Keeping with the theme of sustainability, the materials with which the garden will be built are recycled. "The University maintains this [area] called the boneyard," Kardasis said, describing it as an area where surplus materials from other University building projects are "just sitting there unclaimed and unused." The contestants received permission to use anything from the boneyard.

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"Finally having a project that's actually going to be built" has been an exciting prospect, Reynolds said. "It is a chance to improve [the] design even more."

Kardasis and Ha initiated the AdHoc competition last year as a chance for architecture students to "get their hands dirty," Ha said. Last year's contest was to design part of the exterior of a renovated section of the architecture school's building.

He added that he believes it is important for architecture students to start building as soon as they can, and not wait until they have entered the world of professional architecture. "There is nothing better [for an architecture student] ... than to have something built," he said.

The competition's design for a sustainable garden appealed to the contest's organizers, Kardasis said. He explained that he and Ha wanted something to build, and Schwab was looking for someone to build her garden. "It was a really good marriage," he said.

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Ha added, "it's a beneficial relationship for [the architecture school and the University] ... it's good to have something that is serving the greater community of the University."

Schwab said that the school of architecture does not currently emphasize sustainability, and thought the competition would increase awareness among students, particularly architecture students. "It is important for people who want to be architects to learn about designing sustainably," she said.