ASID Texas
2024 Austin Design Excellence Awards
Awards Program Dates
My Awards Program Entries
ASID TEXAS CHAPTER AUSTIN DESIGN COMMUNITY
2024 DESIGN EXCELLENCE AWARDS
VERY IMPORTANT:
It is critical that you read all of the information provided below, as well as all of the information provided in the 4 documents located in the “Downloadable Files” section on the right side of this page, which are:
- Competition Categories (that contain additional details)
- Competition Submittal Information
- Owner Permission Form
- Photography Permission Form
Also, as to avoid critical notifications from going to your spam/junk folder, add the email address support@cpjam.com to your email address books.
ENTRY PROCESS
- All entries will be submitted online through this competition website between Thu, Feb 1 @ 8:00 AM CST – Mon, Apr 1 @ 5:00 PM CST.
- Entries may be started, partially finished, and saved before the submission deadline. In other words, you do not have to submit all of the entry components at the same time.
- Once an entry is complete, click the "Submit" button at the bottom of your entry. Even if you click the "Submit" button, you may still go back and edit your entry up until the deadline, but be sure to press the "Submit" button again when you finish making updates.
ENTRY DEADLINE
All entry information, Owner and Photography permission forms, drawings, and photos with payment must be completed online and submitted on the competition website no later than 5:00 PM CST on Monday, April 1, 2024. Since the competition is open for submittals for 8 weeks (4 weeks longer than our usual 4 weeks), THERE WILL BE NO DEADLINE EXTENSIONS.
ENTRY FEES
Entry fees are as follows:
- Designer categories [includes the 2 Industry Partner Collaboration categories]:
- Early Bird [Thu, Feb 1 @ 8:00 AM CST – Thu, Feb 22 @ 8:00 AM CST]: $75 per entry
- Regular [Thu, Feb 22 @ 8:00 AM CST – Mon, Apr 1 @ 5:00 PM CST]: $100 per entry
- Emerging Professional categories [1 Commercial and 1 Residential]:
- Early Bird [Thu, Feb 1 @ 8:00 AM CST – Thu, Feb 22 @ 8:00 AM CST]: $35 per entry
- Regular [Thu, Feb 22 @ 8:00 AM CST – Mon, Apr 1 @ 5:00 PM CST]: $50 per entry
- Student categories [1 Commercial and 1 Residential]:
- Early Bird [Thu, Feb 1 @ 8:00 AM CST – Thu, Feb 22 @ 8:00 AM CST]: $15 per entry
- Regular [Thu, Feb 22 @ 8:00 AM CST – Mon, Apr 1 @ 5:00 PM CST]: $25 per entry
Entrants to pay all entry fees online via credit card on this competition website at the time of initial entry registration.
VERY IMPORTANT: The addition of the Early Bird pricing and the extended submission window means that THERE WILL BE NO REFUNDS for incomplete entries as there have been in the past. Therefore, be careful only to purchase entries for projects for which you intend to fully complete the submission process.
ELIGIBLE ENTRANTS
The Design Excellence competition is open to the following:
Designers, a.k.a. Practioners:
- Practitioner members (Professional, Allied and Associate) must be in good standing with ASID.
- Practitioner members must be officially assigned to the Austin Design Community within the ASID Texas Chapter.
- Practitioner members must have been the Lead Designer of the team unless the entire Firm has joined ASID as a Firm Partner as part of ASID's newly launched membership structure.
Emerging Professionals:
- For the 2 Emerging Professional categories (Commercial & Residential), an Emerging Professional is defined as someone who has earned their Interior Design degree within the last 5 years and is currently practicing interior design.
- Emerging Professionals are also allowed to enter all other Designer categories (except the 2 Student categories).
Industry Partners:
- For the 2 Industry Partner Collaboration categories (Commercial & Residential), the collaboration with the Designer must occur with an ASID Industry Partner in good standing with ASID.
- The Designer should be the who actually submits the entry.
- The ASID Industry Partner Representative must be named in the entry's "Team Members and Titles" field in the entry form.
Students:
- Student members must be in good standing with ASID.
- As long as a Student member is enrolled in a program that falls under the umbrella of the ASID Texas Chapter, he/she may enter this competition. In other words, this competition is not limited to Student members living or enrolled in a program in the Austin area.
- Though Students are allowed to enter all 4 of the ASID Texas Design Community competitions - i.e., Austin's Design Excellence Awards, Dallas' Design Ovation Awards, Fort Worth's Shining Star Awards, and San Antonio's Pinnacle of Design Awards - they may not enter a specific project in more than one competition. They may, however, enter different projects in any of the 4 competitions.
- For the 2 Student categories (Commercial & Residential), the Student member must list collaborators in the entry's "Team Members and Titles" field in the entry form if submitting a group project.
ELIGIBLE ENTRIES
- Each project entered must have been completed after January 1, 2019.
- The location of the project does not matter - just where the designer/firm is located.
- If a project has ever been a winner in Design Excellence then it cannot be resubmitted. A winner includes all categories, either 1st, 2nd Place or Honorable Mention.
- If a project has been submitted previously into Design Excellence and not won in ANY category, then it can be resubmitted.
- If a project has won other awards through design contests such as SubZero-Wolf, NKBA, NARI, etc. it can be submitted as long as it meets the above requirements.
- Previously published projects may be entered.
- Comprehensive projects may be entered in only one (1) category. However, different rooms from the same project may be entered in multiple categories if they are not included/shown as part of the comprehensive project. For example… If you enter XYZ Residence in “R02: Entire Residence (< 5,000 SF)”, “R04: Kitchen – New Construction” and “R10: Bathroom – New Construction”, then photos included in the kitchen and bathroom entries may NOT also be included in the entry for “R02: Entire Residence (< 5,000 SF)”.
- Only two (2) projects per Entrant per category are allowed.
- All entries must adhere to entry requirements and judging criteria. Failure to comply with these specifications will result in disqualification of entry and forfeiture of the entry fees.
DESCRIPTIONS / PHOTOGRAPHY / DRAWINGS
- No identification of designer, firm or project shall be included in the Design Concept Statement, Project Challenges, Project Design Solutions or photo captions. Entries failing to follow instructions will be disqualified with no refund.
- No identification of designer, firm or project shall be visible on uploaded photography and/or drawings (including file names), including Designer name / Firm name and respective logos, trademarks, etc. However, in commercial design categories, it is acceptable for Client's company logos and signage to appear in photographs. Entries failing to follow instructions will be disqualified with no refund.
- If the photos submitted do not have permission to be published by both the Photographer and the Owner, then the project cannot be entered.
- Professional photographs are not required, but high quality photos definitely help “sell” the project to judges. You may want to reference the webinar "How To Take Magazine Worthy Smartphone Photos" that the ASID Texas Chapter offered in 2022.
- During the submission process, indicate the ONE photograph you would like to have published to represent your project should you be a winner. To do this, click the image thumbnail, then click “Edit/View,” and then click the checkbox that says “Select as entry cover photo.”
JUDGING CRITERIA
100 points possible with the following breakdown for all categories but the 5 categories listed below:
- Design Concept Statement: 15 points
- Design Challenges & Solutions: 20 points
- Effective Space Planning/ Functional Use of Space: 15 points
- Scale & Proportion: 15 points
- Creativity: 15 points
- Overall Quality of Project: 20 points
100 points possible with the following breakdown for categories C10, C11, R19, R20 & AD03:
- Design Concept Statement: 15 points
- Design Challenges & Solutions: 20 points
- Scale & Proportion: 15 points
- Creativity: 25 points
- Overall Quality of Project: 25 points
Judges are selected from ASID Practitioner members across the nation and represent a variety of disciplines. They reserve the right to award any combination of honors in a particular category – e.g. a 2nd Place in absence of a 1st Place. Judges may also re-categorize any entry, if in their opinion, it has been entered in the wrong category or if the entry is better suited to another category. The judges reserve the right not to issue an award for a category where they feel the quality of work does not meet the design standards.
TIPS FOR WINNING ENTRIES
- When writing your Design Concept Statement, Project Challenges, Project Design Solutions, and Photo Captions, take great care to include as many relevant details as possible to demonstrate the extensive thought process, knowledge base, and skill set used to formulate the design. Vague and/or scant explanations score lower. Pay attention to grammar, spelling, and typos, and take care to write professionally and in complete sentences.
- When uploading project and/or “Before” photos, take the time to caption each photo with detailed information about what the photo is showing – i.e. design details, identification of materials, challenges overcome, design solutions, etc.
SUBMITTING YOUR ENTRIES INTO CELEBRATING DESIGN TEXAS, THE ASID TEXAS CHAPTER-WIDE COMPETITION
We are again providing a convenient solution for submitting your entries from this competition directly into the Celebrating Design Texas Awards, the ASID Texas Chapter-wide competition, which will be open for submissions May 1-31, 2024. To do so, there are two easy steps.
- When editing each of your entries, at the bottom of the 'Designer/Team Information' area there is a box to check if you want to save your entry for submission into the Celebrating Design Texas Awards. Check this box for each entry that you wish to enter into both competitions.
- You will be required to submit payment for the chapter competition, which will reactivate the entry. The link for submitting payment will be provided once the Celebrating Design Texas competition opens on May 1st.
AWARDS EVENT
The Awards Event date and location are TBA but is anticipated to occur in late August. Stay tuned for information.
QUESTIONS
If you have a question about…
- Membership status
- Emerging Professionals status or categories
- Industry Partner status or categories
- How an entry should be classified
- Which ASID Texas Chapter Design Community you officially belong to
- If your School falls under the umbrella of the ASID Texas Chapter
- Or anything else
...then contact Chapter I.T. Chair Laura McDonald Stewart, FASID: laura_mcdonald@mac.com / 214-394-2963 c.