The work continues on POLITO Studio, the internationalization project born from the collaboration between the Association of Architects and the Polytechnic University of Turin to offer professionals and students new opportunities for their future, ‘an agreement that adequately responds to the demand for innovation and new interactions between universities and the professions’, explains Massimo Giuntoli, President of the Association of Architects of Turin, ‘favoring access to international markets for Italian designers’.
Signed last September, the agreement will go live as planned in the new year, kicking off a busy program of activities. It will begin on February 2nd with the webinar ‘Working with China. Opportunities and exchanges in architectural practice’ for an overview of the Chinese market and opportunities for designers (registration will open in January).
Also in February, the virtual notice board will be activated where all useful information on calls for tenders and design competitions in China, Latin America, and Africa, selected in cooperation with the Polytechnic University of Turin, will be collected.
Furthermore, through an ‘open call’ reserved for members of the Association, a shortlist of professionals will be selected to participate in a program of training and market accompaniment workshops that will provide the tools for professional activity in China. This program will be based on concrete project cases (architecture competitions, contests) and will be structured as an incubator, which may give rise to subsequent joint design activities between University Departments and professionals. Interested parties will be selected on the basis of professional profiles and experience, to form multi-skilled teams that will work with a two-year commitment.
An observatory will also be set up to monitor international best practices that demonstrate innovation in the relationship between professional institutions and the missions of academic institutions. In particular, the observatory will be concerned with the construction of schemes that highlight recurrences and differences on a geographical, methodological, and normative basis, and the results of this work will be published periodically on the Association’s website and through columns in architectural journals.
Among the first announcements within the framework of POLITO Studio, two international tenders both with deadlines on 15 January 2021: the international tender for the design of the Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, Academy of Sciences of China (go to the website dedicated to the tender for the design of the Shenzhen Institute) and the tender for the design of the new headquarters of the Italian Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya (download the tender from the Embassy website).
