Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, Jerusalem, Israel, is launching an international architecture competition for its new campus in the historical city center. This project promises to be one of the most significant architectural undertakings of this decade in Jerusalem, and we would like to invite architects from around the world to participate.
The competition documents and all related materials are available on:
www.bezalel-competition.org.il
The competition will be conducted in two phases and is open to all architects.
The official language of the competition is English.

Competition Open
01.09.2006
Submission Deadline Phase I
18.01.2007
Submission Deadline Phase II
05.2007
Results
06.2007

About Bezalel
Established in 1906 as the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts, Bezalel is celebrating its centenary as Israel¡¯s leading academy in its field. Bezalel incorporates both traditional crafts and state-of-the-art technologies throughout its 10 departments: Fine Arts, Architecture, Industrial Design, Visual Communications, Photography, Video, Animation, Ceramic and Glass Design, Jewelry and Fashion, and History and Theory. The Academy is home to 1,765 students and 400 teachers, and is spread over three campuses ¨C Mount Scopus, Jerusalem, the Historic Building of Bezalel in Jerusalem City Center, and the Bezalel Gallery in Tel Aviv.

About the New Campus
The main campus of the Academy on Mount Scopus is distant and isolated from the city center, disconnected from any social or public association. The relocation of the campus to the center of Jerusalem presents not merely a physical move, but a cultural shift through which Bezalel aims to continue to grow as an active and dynamic hub in the city, participating in Jerusalem¡¯s urban life, allowing students and teachers to form unconstrained relationships and to cultivate mutual inspiration with the diverse inhabitants of the city.

About the Site
The vacant building site is approximately 9,182m2 and is in the center of the City of Jerusalem, about 300m from the historic Old City and within the area known as the ¡®Russian Compound¡¯. It sits on a small hill located on a prominent North-South ridge, with Northern and Easter views overlooking the city. In 1858, the compound had been sold to the Russian Empire who developed it as a pilgrimage center with hospices, a hospital, the Russian Mission building and the Holy Trinity Cathedral as its centerpiece. With the rise of communist rule in the Soviet Union, the stream of Russian pilgrims to Jerusalem ceased almost entirely. The British Mandate then converted the Compound into one of their military bases in Jerusalem. Following the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, most of the buildings in the Compound were sold by the Soviet Union to the Israeli government, who used them as part of the government center. Rehabilitation and preservation of the Compound is part of the scheme for the development of the city center as a business, cultural and public district.

Jury
Prof. Architect Toshiko Mori, Professor in Practice and Chair, Department of Architecture, Graduate Institute of Design, Harvard University
Prof. Architect Moshe Safdie, Boston, Jerusalem
Prof. Arnon Zuckerman, President of Bezalel
Prof. Hanoch Gutfreund, Former President of the Hebrew University, Jerusalem
Prof. Architect Zvi Efrat, Head of the Department of Architecture, Bezalel
A Student of Bezalel

Registration
Registration for Phase I will be via the form on the competition website and by payment in the sum of 100 USD.

Phase I
Phase I is open and anonymous, and the objective is to develop ideas and concepts for the design of the new campus according to the programme (available in the Competition Documents) and to provide a basis for further planning in Phase II.

Phase II
The aim of Phase II of the competition is to select a design for the new campus of Bezalel and to appoint the winning architect. The current zoning plan acting on the site will be changed according to the selected design. Phase II is a closed competition in which the winning entries of Phase I shall participate and compete alongside the following invited firms:
Ada Karmi-Melamede Architects, Tel Aviv, Israel
Foreign Office Architects, London, UK
Rosenfeld Arens Architects Ltd., Jerusalem, Israel
One additional international architecture firm to be announced

Awards
Phase I
5 Honourable Mentions: 5,000 USD each
Between 3-5 winners: to participate in Phase II

Phase II
Bezalel shall participate in the expenses of those competing in Phase II in an amount that shall be equivalent to 25,000 USD (tax and VAT included) per competitor. In addition, Bezalel shall participate in the lodging expenses of those participating in Phase II from overseas in he sum of 10,000 USD (tax and VAT included). These amounts shall be paid after the completion and submission of the design, to the satisfaction of Bezalel.

Winning Architect
Bezalel will appoint the winning architect and will proceed to an Architectural Services Agreement.

Contacts:
Competition Production Team: Richard Rabnett & Shira Szabo competition@bezalel.ac.il
Bezalel Spokesperson (Hebrew): Nava Levi nava@bezalel.ac.il