02 ELIGIBILITY

The Cleveland Chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA Cleveland) invites you to join us in celebrating exemplary designs of Northeast Ohio firms at the annual Cleveland Design Awards.

Call for Entries Posting: Monday, August 14th, 2023

Open Water Submissions Open: Friday, August 25th, 2023

Project Entry Submission Deadline: Monday, October 2nd, 2023, at 5:00 pm

Eligibility

Project Eligibility:

*AIA membership is not required to enter submissions into the Makers and Student categories or the Photography Awards, but required for all other submissions.

The goal of the Cleveland Design Awards program is to focus on high quality projects designed by AIA Cleveland members. All AIA Cleveland members (Emeritus, Professional, Associate, and Allied Professionals) in good standing are eligible to submit entries regardless of project size, budget, geographic location, or building type.

General Submission Requirements

1. Authorship: The submitting firm (referred to as the “submitting individual”) MUST BE the Design Firm/Designer of Record, responsible for the overall design of the project concept. If you are a local firm (as identified within AIA Cleveland boundaries) partnered with an outside firm, you will be asked to provide documentation stating you are responsible for the overall project concept during the submission process. This documentation must be signed by a managing partner of the partner firm and must relinquish overall project design credit to the local firm. If this particular project would win an award, only the local firm will be listed on the award. If two local firms (as identified within AIA Cleveland boundaries) partner on a project that they would like to submit, both firms will be acknowledged as long as they provide documentation stating each local firm split design responsibilities in half.

2. Office Location: The submitting firm (referred to as the “submitting individual”) identified within the criteria listed above must have a current operating office (project/job offices are not eligible) located within AIA Cleveland’s Chapter boundaries. In addition, there must be one principal located in that office who is a current member of AIA Cleveland. This will be verified through the membership # provided during the appliction process.

3. Project Team: A team member from the project team responsible for the overall design of the project concept must also be a current member of AIA Cleveland. This project team member will be referred to as the “Project Team Contact” and will need to provide their AIA membership number at time of registration. This will be verified through the membership # provided during the appliction process.

The same project may be submitted for multiple categories in any given year as long as separate submissions are purchased. Projects that have won awards outside of the AIA Cleveland Design Awards Program are eligible for submission. Previous AIA Cleveland Design Award winners may not be resubmitted. A project that has previously won an AIA Cleveland Design Award may resubmit if that project submission now wishes to highlight an instance for a “Makers” award. Projects that have previously won an award in the “Makers” category may submit in the Architecture, Interior Architecture, or Small Projects category. If your project includes multiple phases over an extended timeframe, those phases are permitted to be submitted separately but must read as standalone projects. References or images of the previous phase will result in the disqualification of the entry. Project scope must be clearly defined. Firms and individuals are encouraged to re-enter projects previously submitted if they did not win an award and if they meet the above criteria. Project entries must have been completed on or after January 1, 2018.

Photography Eligibility:

*AIA membership is not required to enter a submission in the photography category. This category was founded to capture and honor architects, design professionals, architectural students, professional photographers, and amateur photographers whose amazing talents are showcased in their photographic interpretation of the designed environment. By entering a submission in this category, you hereby accept these restrictions:

- To qualify to enter this category, you must be over 18 years of age.

- This category is open to both Professional and Amateur photographers.

- This category is open to AIA members, Non-members, and students.

- The subject matter is limited to the State of Ohio. The subject matter must have an architectural theme or contain some element of the man-made environment.

- Each participant can submit up to 4 photos per online submission at a cost of $40. Entrants may only enter a maximum of (3) submissions for a total of (12) photos.

- The photographer(s) must be the author(s) of the pictures submitted in his/her/their name.

- Pictures submitted CANNOT include professionally commissioned photographs.

- All submitted photographs will be grouped together and judged in the same category no matter what level of experience the photographer has.

- Eligible photographs can include the use of all professional editing equipment and software as well as all mobile device photograph apps and software. (For example, Lightroom, Instagram, etc.)

Photographs that have won awards in other programs are eligible for submission. Previous AIA Cleveland Photography Award winning photographs may not be resubmitted. All photograph images must have been taken on or after January 1, 2022.

Photographer submitter agrees to:

- By submitting a photography entry, you agree and acknowledge that AIA Cleveland is permitted to receive and review your registration data. Participants agree that personal data including, but not limited to, name, mailing address, phone number, and email address may be collected, processed, stored and otherwise used for the purposes of conducting and administering these photography awards.

- All entrants agree that all photograph(s) submitted to this category may be reproduced (with photographer copyright credit) and used to conduct and promote AIA Cleveland. You hereby grant AIA Cleveland with a right to use submitted photographs in the framework of such promotional activities.

- You acknowledge that AIA Cleveland and its event partners assume no responsibility and are not liable for any image misuse.

- Images are subject to cropping and resizing to fit marketing and printed material.

- You agree to participate in related publicity and to the use of your name and winning images for the purposes of advertising, promotion and publicity for AIA Cleveland and the competition without additional compensation. Such requests will not be unreasonably withheld.

- AIA Cleveland reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to disqualify and remove any photograph that does not comply with the following requirements, even after the photograph appears on the website. You warrant, in respect of the photographs submitted by you, as follows: You have the right to enter your photographs in this category, You are the sole copyright owner and creator of the photographs, to the best of your knowledge, the photographs do not contain any infringing, threatening, false, misleading, abusive, harassing, libelous, defamatory, vulgar, obscene, scandalous, inflammatory, pornographic or profane content. To the best of your knowledge, the photographs do not contain any material that could constitute or encourage conduct which would be considered a criminal offense, give rise to civil liability, or otherwise violate any law.