Figures of Architecture (Submission Deadline 22 November 2026)
Nov 22, 2025
3 min read
Updated: Oct 20
A student design competition on climate resilience and adaptation
Enter Figures of Architecture: Designing for a Climate That Is No Longer Static. Organized by Paloe and exhibited at DesignTO Festival, Canada’s largest annual design festival, this student competition invites emerging designers across Ontario to bring the hidden parts of architecture into view and to show the public how buildings can adapt to a changing climate.
PRIZES + FABRICATION SUPPORT: $2,525 CAD
Built Finalists (×3): $500 CAD fabrication budget each
Built: 1st $150 · 2nd $100 · 3rd $50
Digital: 1st $300 · 2nd $150 · 3rd $75
People’s Choice — Built: $100
People’s Choice — Digital: $100
All winners: founding Paloe membership, publication, and exhibition at DesignTO Festival 2027
DATES:
Competition launch: 13 October 2026
Jury announced: 1 November 2026
Submission deadline: 22 November 2026
Finalists announced: 14 December 2026
Exhibition: DesignTO Festival, January 2027, The Bakery, Liberty Village, Toronto
Event + awards: 29 January 2027
PARTICIPANTS: Students in architecture and related spatial design disciplines in Ontario. Individuals or teams.
COST: $10 CAD per entry
Architecture is usually judged by its finished form. But the decisions that determine how a building survives heat, flooding and extreme weather are made at a much smaller scale: in the wall, the joint, the membrane, the connection. Once construction is complete, these are the parts no one sees.
The Hidden Figures of Architecture
Toronto, like every major city, is designing for conditions that are shifting under its feet: hotter summers, heavier rainfall, more frequent extreme weather and growing pressure on resources. Climate adaptation is often discussed at the scale of cities and infrastructure. This competition argues it is just as urgent at the scale of a single brick, stud or fastener: how something drains, shades, breathes, insulates, flexes, gets repaired or comes apart. Figures of Architecture asks students to bring these overlooked elements into focus and reconsider their role in a climate that is no longer predictable.
The Challenge: One Brief, Two Responses
The competition runs in two streams, judged and awarded separately.
Built Stream - design-build.
Students propose a physical, freestanding intervention or prototype exploring climate resilience through one or more lenses:
Materials: rethinking a single material or component, such as brick, steel stud, membrane, insulation or timber
Assemblies: how layers, joints, envelopes and connections respond to changing conditions
Methods: assembly, disassembly, repair, reuse and adaptation over time
Proposals must fit within a 48" × 40" footprint and 7' height. Three finalists will receive a $500 fabrication budget and build their work at 1:1 scale for exhibition.
Digital Stream - one image.
Students create a single still visual exploring how a building, street, landscape, piece of infrastructure, neighbourhood or city could adapt to a changing climate, ideally starting from a real condition in the Greater Toronto Area. Photography, drawing, rendering, collage, illustration or mapping are all welcome. This is not a presentation board: the image must carry the idea.
Strong entries will go beyond naming a climate problem. They will show architectural thinking, demonstrate an understanding of material, construction, system or place, and weigh broader sustainability principles: embodied carbon, reuse, durability, repairability and water management.
From Studio Review to Public Stage
Most student work ends at a studio review. Figures of Architecture ends in public. Finalists will be exhibited at The Bakery in Liberty Village during DesignTO Festival 2027, in front of architects, designers, fabricators, industry partners and the general public. The aim is to make construction and climate adaptation visible and understandable to people who never see inside a wall.
Entries are reviewed by a non-anonymous jury of architecture and design professionals and members of the broader design community, to be announced 1 November. The public will also vote on two People’s Choice Awards through a campaign on Paloe’s social channels.
The future of architecture won’t only be decided by what we build, but by what we build with.
