An Invitation to Collaborate

I felt very grateful when I was invited to meet some local architects. The friend who invited thought as a Canadian architect, I could contribute to an international design competition. A multidisciplinary team is designing an entry for a new modular lab for the Brazilian Antarctica station. In 2012, the Ferrante site burnt down. Today Brazil intends to rebuilt the station entirely, with some environmental requirements, as it would be expected for such location. The competition is sponsored by the the Brazilian navy and the Institute of Brazilian Architects.
Quite an interesting program indeed. Modularity. Cold climate. Extreme conditions. All things that are interesting to me.

The group was really welcoming, it was very nice to attend a few meetings all held in Portuguesse. Just that feels like some kind of accomplishment for me. I'll write more about the language later. 
It was nice to be back at the designing table, and to experience again the joy of doodling and discussing ideas. The group is composed of mostly young professionals, and headed by a couple and the wife's dad. He and his son-in-law own a small firm in Lago Sul. And they have put together a team of energetic young professionals motivated to win this competition. Here is an image of the final entry.

In the end, they were doing what most architects do when working on a competition: working at night and over the weekends. On a schedule that is just not compatible with my own. So I just could not really integrate the team. But it was nice for a few meetings to exchange ideas over a sketch paper.
In the end, another team won the competition (here is the winning entry). What is interesting is that we tried something similar to this form...