Daniels Faculty Master of Architecture student Peter Kitchen has been announced the winner of the HOUSE 2020 competition, WORKSHOP Inc.’s student ideas contest to design a smart house of the future.

The competition sought proposals that were both innovative and pragmatic, and could lead to construction of a prototype on a suburban lot in Southern Ontario by the year 2020. Launched in the summer of 2014, it engaged students over a six-month period in discussions with experts on a “smart” house for the future, posing the question “what is smart now?” The competition was originated and sponsored by Hong Kong-based real estate developer and designer Kin Yeung.

The jury admired Kitchen’s proposal for backgrounding rather than foregrounding technology, and “allowing us to read a broad range of possibilities” including the accommodation of extended families and communal living. In addition, it noted that the design employed an intelligent approach, promoting intensive land use that could result in higher suburban density. Jury members included professors Carol Moukheiber and Ted Kesik (University of Toronto), professor Colin Ripley (Ryerson University), and Kin Yeung.

Peter Kitchen received an undergraduate degree from the University of Waterloo and is now in the Master of Architecture program at the University of Toronto’s John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design. Second Place was awarded to Javier Huerta-Juarez and Christopher Tron, and Third Place was awarded to Nabia Majeed, all of whom are also students in the University of Toronto's Master of Architecture program.

WORKSHOP is presenting an exhibition on HOUSE 2020 and the Stage Two competition projects from February 5 through April 25. The exhibition is open to the public Tuesday through Saturday, 12 to 6, on the Lower Concourse at 80 Bloor Street West in Toronto.

Click here to download the complete press release from WORKSHOP and selected drawings.