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The much-awaited “ KSRM AWARDS FOR FUTURE ARCHITECTS 2020: For Best Undergraduate Thesis” was announced to all the IAB accredited architecture programs of Bangladesh through the “call for entries” on October 31, 2020 - accompanied with Program Brief, Schedule and other essentials. The Departments were asked to nominate three best Theses/Final Projects that had their final jury in between July 1, 2019 and June 30, 2020, to be submitted to IAB for the final round of evaluation. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the whole process of this second cycle of the KSRM Awards for Future Architects was executed virtually (online) from ‘call for entries’ up to ‘award ceremony’. The projects that were finally submitted had already gone through an internal screening at their respective schools and then only found their way to final round to be included in the national level for evaluation.

A total of 30 projects from 11 accredited schools were submitted by the deadline of December 7, 2020. A panel of eminent jurors, Ar. Haroon Ur Rashid (Professor, Department of Architecture, North South University), Ar. Jalal Ahmed (Principal & Managing Director JA Architects), Dr. Nasreen Hossain (Professor, Department of Architecture, BUET), Ar. Ashik Vaskor Mannan (Associate professor, American International University-Bangladesh), Ar. Rashed Hassan Chowdhury (Principal architect, Dehsar Works) evaluated these projects on December 18, 2020, and submitted their judgment about the winning entries with citations. Besides the graduating student designer of the winning entries, the Award Program is recognizing their Thesis Studio Teachers and Architecture School as well. The evaluation process was performed with the projects being displayed online in anonymity. 

As per the decision of the Jury panel, the winners of 2020 are:  

1. First Place: ‘Prefabricated Houses of “Ghorer Hat” in Munshiganj: Prospects of Innovative Upgradation and Scaling Up through DIY Adaptable Building’ by Humayra Anan from Bangladesh University of Engineering & Technology (BUET)

2. Second Place: ‘Vatir Purush: Shah Abdul Karim Memorial Museum and Research Center’ by Syed Afaz Ul Mahmud from University of Asia Pacific (UAP)

3. Third Place: ‘ADAPTIVE INFRASTRUCTURES as DISASTER SHELTER: A Simulative Approach to Climate Responsive Architecture’ by Nazmus Sakib from BUET

4. Commendations: Along with these there are two more Commendations announced for the projects called ‘Space Destination’ - Debashish Roy from BUET and ‘A Celebration of Trade and Tradition (an integration of economy, society and history)’- Umme Tahmina Haque from UAP.

On December 20, 2020, the public announcement of the winning entries and the Award Declaration Ceremony was organized using the Zoom platform and shared Live on Facebook for wider participation. Along with the participating students, there were studio teachers, academicians, Honorable Vice-Chancellors, eminent Architects, GOB representatives, IAB EC members, and KSRM representatives during the online event.

 At the end of the Award Ceremony, IAB President Ar. Jalal Ahmed virtually inaugurated the online exhibition for all. All the entries were then publicly displayed in a six day-long online Exhibition from December 20 to December 26, 2020, using KUNSTMATRIX platform. IAB is grateful to the organizers and sponsors of the program for continuing it even in these challenging times during pandemic and expresses thanks to the participants and well-wishers for success of this event which was impossible without their involvement.