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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 8, 2004

Contact: Eric Gerber
713/743-8189 (office)
713/617-7130(pager)
egerber@uh.edu

HOUSTON, April 8, 2004 – His “Inner City Interfaith Chapel” has earned University of Houston architecture student Bryant Alcantara top honors in the inaugural edition of the Interfaith Sacred Space International Competition. Alcantra was one of four winners.

The winning designs will be presented at the meeting of the Parliament of the World’s Religions gathering in Barcelona July 7-13.

“It is a real honor to be recognized by people who understand your vision and support what you are hoping to accomplish,” said Alcantara, a fifth year undergraduate in architecture and environmental design. “This award helps me feel that I’m not wasting my time in architecture and I might actually have a small place in a field with so many brilliant and creative minds whom I admire.”

The competition solicited designs for spaces created for use by peoples of all faiths. Some 159 entries were received from 17 countries.

Alcantara was one of only two students selected as winners. The other student came from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. An architectural firm in Connecticut and a pair of San Francisco architects submitted the remaining two winning entries. Judges represented both architecture and the international interfaith movement.

Alcantara’s award-winning plan describes an urban chapel recessed below ground in an open space, surrounded by a pool, a garden and a fellowship hall. The intention is “to slow down the pace, to bring a clearing to the overgrown concrete jungle and a deep breath to a suffocating downtown,” Alcantara said in his design notes.

“Naturally, we are very proud of Bryant's accomplishment,” said Joseph Mashburn, dean of the College of Architecture. “It’s especially impressive when you consider this was open to architectural firms, not just a student competition. Our last accreditation team -- prestigious designers who’ve visited the college, and the jurors of many competitions -- agree the quality of our students' design work is outstanding. This provides further proof of that.”

The competition is jointly sponsored by the American Institute of Architects/San Francisco chapter, EURIMA (Expressing the United Religions Initiative in Music and the Arts), the Interfaith Center at the Presidio in partnership with the United Religions Initiative and the Council for a Parliament of the World’s Religions.

Alcantara, 24, is originally from Los Angeles but moved to Houston when he was 16. He earned an associate’s degree from San Jacinto Junior College before enrolling at UH. He plans to pursue a master’s degree in architecture.

For more information about the Gerald D. Hines College of Architecture, visit the Web site http://www.arch.uh.edu/home/index.html.

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