The Cold Formed Steel Engineers Institute, Washington, D.C., will present in October its first Award for Innovative Design. The institute is seeking entrants. The winning award and honorable mentions will be announced and presented to the project’s design team at an awards ceremony to be held at METALCON International in Baltimore. Projects selected for incorporation of winning innovations will be widely showcased and publicized. The award is based on a project’s inclusion of one or more of the following criteria:
- Innovative yet appropriate use of one or more aspects of the North American Specification for the Design of Cold-Formed Steel Structural Members to solve design or construction challenges.
- Innovative yet appropriate use of one or more aspects of the AISI Standards for Cold-Formed Steel Framing to solve design or construction challenges.
- Designs that appropriately use exposed cold-formed steel framing in an attractive or decorative and code-compliant manner.
- Designs that use an innovative process, tool, technique or methodology to solve one or more of the key issues or barriers identified by the Steel Framing Alliance, Washington, D.C., technology development committee.
- Designs that use an innovative product, process, tool, technique or methodology to grow the market for cold-formed steel framing. Data showing potential and actual market growth may be submitted to support claims.
- Individual products, tools or machines (examples: framing table, new type of screw, new type of connector) cannot be submitted as a stand-alone entry. However, the use of a product, process or tool on a specific project qualifies the project itself for entry. All building types will be considered, but the project must have been completed or initiated between Jan. 1, 2002, and April 30, 2008. Organizations or individuals can enter multiple projects in the competition, but each project must be submitted separately. The entry deadline is June 1 at midnight PST.
