Scholarships: The Latest Architecture and News

Foundations established by architects have increasingly become involved in architectural education through scholarships, fellowships, and interdisciplinary academic programs. These initiatives often aim to support students, promote research, and facilitate broader engagement with architecture and the built environment. Some architect-initiated foundations, such as the Zaha Hadid Foundation, which recently launched the Zaha Hadid Scholars Program at the American University of Beirut, along with the Norman Foster Foundation and the SOM Foundation, have introduced educational programs connected to their missions. While these programs differ in structure and focus, they commonly seek to extend the legacies of their founders by addressing contemporary challenges in design education. Their activities range from localized scholarship offerings to global research collaborations, reflecting a diverse approach to nurturing emerging talent and advancing architectural discourse.

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The Master in Advanced Architecture at IAAC celebrates its 25th anniversary as one of the most forward-looking programs in architectural education. Founded in 2000 in Barcelona, the program was created as a space for experimentation—where design meets technology, ecology and critical thinking, far from the conventions of traditional architectural training.

Over the years, the program has welcomed more than 1,000 students from over 80 countries. This international mix is no accident; it reflects IAAC's understanding of innovation as something that grows through dialogue, diversity and shared ambition. The result is a network of professionals working at the intersection of design, research, and systemic change.

As the holiday season approaches, so do college application deadlines. SCI-Arc’s priority deadline is January 15, 2023, at 11:59pm. All applicants that submit by the priority deadline will have their application reviewed for merit-based scholarship consideration.

The Graham Foundation has announced the award of 56 new grants to individuals exploring ideas that expand contemporary understandings of architecture. The recipients have been selected from an open call that resulted in nearly 500 submissions. The selected projects are led by 81 individuals with diverse backgrounds. The funded projects, including exhibitions, publications, films, and podcasts, among other formats, encourage experimentation and foster critical discourse in architecture.

The Graham Foundation has announced the award of 69 new scholarships to individuals around the world who support architectural projects. The funded projects represent diverse lines of research with original ideas that advance our understanding of the designed environment.

Selected from more than 500 proposals, the funded projects include exhibitions, publications, films, and performances that promote rigorous academic study, stimulate experimentation, and foster critical discourse in architecture. Innovative projects are led by established and emerging architects, artists, curators, filmmakers, historians, and photographers, among other professionals.

The Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts has announced 2020 Grants to Individuals. A total of 52 new grants will support critical projects that tackle contemporary issues, broaden historical perspectives, and explore the future of architecture and the designed environment. They are awarded for research, exhibitions, publications, films, and digital initiatives, among other formats.

People are moving into urban centers at an unprecedented rate. According to the United Nations, the world's urban population has increased from 751 million in 1950 to 4.2 billion in 2018. By 2050, an additional 2.5 billion people are expected to reside in urban areas. In response to this rapid urban growth, designers are challenged to create sustainable and resilient spaces that accommodate complex human needs, both necessary and desired.

World-renowned architecture, interior design, engineering, and urban planning firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM) invites educators and students from across the U.S. to engage in the 2018 SOM Foundation Research Prize: "Humanizing High Density." The SOM Foundation Research Prize is awarded to a faculty-led interdisciplinary design research proposal "with the potential to advance the practice of architecture, structures, urban design and related design disciplines."

Are.na Grants is a new initiative to support research, writing, and other creative projects that are being developed and built on Are.na. For the first set of grants, we are especially interested in projects that address issues around the shifting nature of “knowledge work,” algorithmic governance, and networked learning, though proposals of all kinds are welcome.

The Graham Foundation has announced the list of recipients of their annual Grants to Organizations program, established to “advance new scholarship, fuel creative experimentation and critical dialogue, and expand opportunities for public engagement with architecture and its role in contemporary society.”

For 2017, over $400,000 USD has been awarded to 41 projects from around the world within 5 categories: Exhibitions, Film/Video/New Media, Publications, Public Programs and Other Fellowships. In its 61 year history, the Graham Foundation has given more than 4,300 grants to individuals and institutions.

“This year marks an extraordinary group of projects from organizations around the world working to advance architectural thinking, push the boundaries of the field, and expand into previously underrepresented areas,” said Graham Foundation director Sarah Herda on the 2017 grantees.

Continue reading for the full list of recipients, with descriptions provided by the Graham Foundation.

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The Getty Foundation has selected 12 significant 20th century buildings to receive 2017 grants as part of its Keeping It Modern initiative, which aims to advance the understanding and preservation of modern architecture through a focus on conservation planning and research. Since its founding in 2014, the program has supported the preservation of 45 projects from around the globe.

This year $1.66 million in grants were awarded to recognizable projects including the Walter Gropius-designed Bauhaus Building in Dessau; the Melnikov House in Moscow (the first Russian project to receive a grant); and Frank Lloyd Wright’s only skyscraper, Price Tower. 

See all 12 grantees below.

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Chilean architect Samuel Bravo has been selected as the winner of the Harvard University Graduate School of Design 2017 Wheelwright Prize, a $100,000 travel grant established to support “investigative approaches to contemporary design.”

Bravo’s research proposal, Projectless: Architecture of Informal Settlements, seeks to study the architecture of traditional and informal settlements, offering a contemporary revisiting of Bernard Rudofsky’s “architecture without architects” exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art in 1964.

The Graham Foundation has announced the list of 72 recipients of their 2017 “Grants to Individuals,” awarding over $560,000 in support of “innovative projects engaging original ideas in architecture.”

Helmed by architects, designers, curators, artists, writers and more, the 2017 projects range from a study of the relationship between water and African cities by Kunlé Adeyemi and Suzanne Lettieri; to an exploration of Oscar Niemeyer’s oft-overlooked Algerian period; to an exhibition surrounding the complex civic issues along the US/Mexico border.

“These diverse projects advance new scholarship, fuel creative experimentation and critical dialogue, and expand opportunities for public engagement with architecture and its role in contemporary society,” explain the Graham Foundation.

This year, nearly 700 submissions were considered, with a total of 99 grantees representing 20 countries selected to receive grants. Over the past 61 years, the Graham Foundation has awarded more than 4,300 grants to individuals and institutions from all over the globe.

See the full list of recipients, after the break.

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Coinciding with the organization’s 60th anniversary this year, The Graham Foundation has announced the list of recipients of their 2016 Grants to Organizations, a total of $419,000 (USD) to be given to 31 exemplary projects from around the world. The Organization Grants are awarded to projects displaying “originality, capacity, feasibility and potential for impact” and are divided amongst four categories: Exhibition, Film/Video/New Media, Public Program, and Publication.

In its 60 years, the foundation has made significant impacts in the fields of art and architecture through the awarding of grants to outstanding projects, exhibitions and publications. They have expanded their exhibition programming in the past few years, including a display at the inaugural Chicago Architecture Biennal last year.

Continue after the break for the full list of recipients.