Cities have been a culmination of all the good things we desire to be in a comfortable habitat. This culmination has brought access to not only services but this vast human-to-human network that eventually lead to evolving as knowledge hubs. This pandemic, however, has changed the fundamental perception of a city in many ways and especially the density it offers.

These times have seen massive shifts from a lockdown like an environment, that isolated us from the outdoors – to workplace/classroom level shifts of working entirely in the remote. This earmarks the fact that in a way we don’t need ‘cities’ anymore, we can live pretty much anywhere now which is visible in the extensive global migration nowadays. These times also revealed how poorly our indoors and neighborhoods are prepared for a pandemic level threat.

Challenge

How can we rethink the city fundamentally not by a complete overhaul, but smaller functional models?

How can we create a jigsaw of such functional architectural modules that make life go on despite such threats around? How can indoors be extended to a neighborhood where isolation is not as bad because of a colony designed with strategic overlaps? How can densities be reinterpreted in cities where healthy living (physical, mental, and social) becomes a top priority?

In a future where remote working/learning is established as a reality, where commute itself is completely abolished from our daily lives, how will our neighborhoods be?

Design brief: Develop a zero commute, mixed-use residential neighborhood concept that is resilient to pandemic impacts and is built for a population that lives, works, and plays in the same place.

Prizes

Prize pool of worth 20,000$

• First Prize: 5000$ (For students and professionals)
• Runner Up: 6 x 1100$ (For students and professionals)
• People’s Choice: 4 x 600$ (Open for all)
• Honorable Mention: 12 x 500$ Each