The American Institute of Steel Construction (AISC) and the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) are announced the winners of the 2025 Steel Design Student Competition.

The 2025 AISC/ACSA Steel Design Student Competition challenged students to explore various design issues related to the use of steel in design and construction. Participating students were offered the opportunity to compete in two separate categories. In Category I, students were challenged to design a library and illustrate its role as an integral part of a community’s civic fabric. Category II presented students with the option to select a site and building program of their choosing, using steel as the primary material.

The thirteen winning projects were selected for their innovative designs using structural steel and their design responses to local contexts. Further details about and photos of each project are available here: acsa-arch.org/competitions/2025-steel-competition/winners/.

For each category, the jurors chose First, Second, and Third-place winners, along with additional Honorable Mentions. The award recipients for this year’s AISC/ACSA Steel Design Student Competition are:

CATEGORY I: LIBRARY +

First Place: Steel Harvest, Savannah College of Art and Design

• Student: Laura Murguía
• Faculty: Alice Guess
• Collaborator: Melanie Parker Dameron

Second Place: Nexus Library +, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona

• Students: Shunta Abe & Kimberly Yan
• Faculty: Katrin Terstegen

Third Place: Urban Incline, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

• Student: Ayush Singh
• Faculty: Leandro Piazzi

Honorable Mention: Books and Building Blocks, University of Oregon

• Students: Jo Herendeen, Ty Pierce & Ivy Smith
• Faculty: Daisy-O’lice Williams

Honorable Mention: Fletcher Library, Woodbury University

• Students: Agustin Ochoa & Wiame Rabbaa
• Faculty: Dylan Bachar

Honorable Mention: Steel Cyclone, Glendale Community College

• Students: Mikayel Sargsyan & Vahe Shahnazaryan
• Faculty: Paul Chiu

Honorable Mention: Urban Ensemble – From Module Systems To Chelsea Jenga, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

• Students: Bennard Amponsah & Qi Han Zheng
• Faculty: Arta Yazdanseta

CATEGORY II: OPEN

First Place: The Still Armada, Kansas State University

• Students: Ethan Edington & Josue Ventura Vasquez
• Faculty: Genevieve Baudoin

Second Place: Nor-Cal 101 Fire Station, Louisiana Tech University

• Students: Blayne Springer, Leyton Spencer & Matthew Wright
• Faculty: Pasquale De Paola & Kevin Singh

Third Place: Cloud-81: Syracuse Urban Incubator, Syracuse University

• Students: Zilin Jing & Jingxiang Zhang
• Faculty: Lauren Scott

Honorable Mention: Royal Naval Archives: Within the Vessel, Kansas State University

• Students: Shane Gallagher & Noah Kotlinski
• Faculty: Genevieve Baudoin

Honorable Mention: Dubai Flow, Syracuse University

• Students: Zhirun Huang & Weixia Luo
• Faculty: Fei Wang

Honorable Mention: The Interstate Viewing, Ball State University

• Student: Ta’riq Abdul-Rahman
• Faculty: Se Won Roy Kim

The competition jurors included:

Category I: LIBRARY +

• Daniel Brown, Savannah College of Art and Design
• Cathleen Jacinto, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
• Camille Sherrod, Kean University

Category II: OPEN

• Robert Clarke, Cal Poly Pomona
• Awilda Rodriguez, University of Oklahoma
• Jade Yang, Kennesaw State University