A design by students of the Faculty of Architecture awarded in the competition in the USA
First year students of Master’s studies at the Faculty of Architecture of the Silesian University of Technology: Dorota Cichoń, Aleksandra Chylak, Oliwia Jagła and Karolina Supron won first place in the prestigious international urban design competition "2025 Edmund N. Bacon Urban Design Awards", organized in Philadelphia.
Students of the Faculty of Architecture of the Silesian University of Technology won the "2025 Edmund N. Bacon Urban Design Awards" competition.
This is a competition established in 2006 in honour of the prominent urban planner Edmund N. Bacon (1910–2005). The competition honours annually both professionals and students for their contribution to the field of urban planning. In this year’s edition, the award for professionals will be given to Vishaan Chakrabarti – architect, founder of PAU architectural design studio | Practice for Architecture and Urbanism. Among the awarded students are the representatives of the Silesian University of Technology, who took part in the competition.
This year’s challenge was to develop a concept for revitalizing the area known as “The Disney Hole” – an unused space in downtown Philadelphia. The goal was to breathe new life into this place, and the project was to take advantage of the possibilities of artificial intelligence.
The concept prepared by students of the Faculty of Architecture composed of Dorota Cichoń, Aleksandra Chylak, Oliwia Jagła and Karolina Supron was created under the supervision of Dr Hab. Eng. Arch. Michał Stangel, Prof. SUT, and Dr Eng. Arch. Agata Goleśna.
“Our approach was based on collaboration with AI, which played a key role in shaping the space. We started by analysing the needs of the local community and the urban context, and then created a functional program adapted to the character of the district. Artificial intelligence helped us in the arrangement of individual functions, analysing both spatial data and the relationships between the elements of the program,” reads the description of the project prepared by the students.
The concept was based on ecological and innovative urban solutions.
“We took into account the most important urban challenges of this place, such as overheating, noise and integration with public transport,” explained the authors of the winning project.
As part of the win, they will travel to the United States to collect the Edmund N. Bacon award at the official gala in Philadelphia on March 26 and present their project to an international group of specialists.
Congratulations to the winners!
