The Winners of the Contest "Create the Virtual Building of Zigurat" have been selected

Last June, Zigurat Global Institute of Technology organized the contest "Create the Virtual Building of Zigurat" that presented its alumni community with the challenge of designing the Zigurat virtual building. Zigurat always tries to bring to its community the latest news in the sector, success stories, and relevant information so that professionals can train and find inspiration close to home with the ultimate goal of evolving the industry towards a better future. That is how the idea of Zigurat Virtual Building came to be, to offer the best possible experience. The rules of the competition required that in addition to meeting the needs of masterclasses, events, workshops and presentation of the training programs, the building would also represent the values of Zigurat, its alumni community and their successes, the evolution of the industry and the vision of building a better world. The different categories where the alumni could participate, and all of which had their prizes, were as follows:

• Exterior volume of the virtual Zigurat building
• Stand to display the construction sector training programs of Zigurat Global Institute of Technology
• Stand to display the training programs of the Zigurat Innovation & Business School
• Institutional stand to show the additional services of Zigurat: Alumni, BIMcommunity, Admissions Advisors, etc.

The winners of this edition have been Armando Martinez and Jorge Ernesto Rodriguez of the Máster Internacional BIM Management. Armando Martinez's proposal has been chosen for its simplicity and for how it has achieved to integrate the values of Zigurat into the design. From his project, several concepts were taken as reference for the new virtual building of Zigurat, such as the elevated entrance that gives notoriety to the building, the name of the institution at the entrance, the vertical slatted façade that gives a skin on one hand with a building scale open to the public and on the other hand the light of knowledge to the interior. From the outside, the square where the building was located is noteworthy, typical of the open spaces of a city's trade fairs. Finally, the interior courtyard of knowledge that the author of the proposal comments on has been taken as a reference, although it has ended up being a covered courtyard to adapt to the needs of the program. The perfect integration of the program's needs has been one of the most valued aspects in the proposal of Jorge Ernesto Rodriguez, the other winner of this edition.  In this case, Jorge Ernesto has designed a large, megalithic building with a hexagonal floor plan, with one of the corners extending and opening outwards through glass walls. The objective: to create the point of entry. The hexagonal floor plan has definitely been a strong concept that has been included in the final proposal. The large interior space for the exhibition area, with a large skylight, was also particularly inspiring. The semi-finalist of the competition was Alumni Javier Alejandro Dueñas Vargas, who also studied the Máster Internacional BIM Management program. His proposal was very pleasing to the eye, as it used volumetry to simulate a section of the original Ziggurat pyramid with unprecedented subtlety and elegance. Each floor was inclined a little to give sinuosity and dynamism to the whole, extending this concept to the reason for the urbanization of the site. The winning projects have been selected by the competition committee made up of:

• Miriam Pérez is in charge of the graphic design area of Zigurat and an expert in transmitting the values of the institution in all its channels.
• Marta León, architect and program manager of Zigurat's structural engineering programs. She has been crucial to determining if the proposals are structurally sound.
• Marta Riera, MBA architect and Program Development Manager at Zigurat, a specialist in comprehending that in the attention to detail is the strength of a proposal.
• Bernabé Farré, MBA engineer, CEO and Founder of Zigurat Global Institute of Technology, indispensable for analyzing whether the building's vision and values are aligned with those of the institution.

With the selected proposals, many clues have already been given to what will become the definitive design of the virtual building of Zigurat, and all that has become possible thanks to the participation of the students in the competition. The winners will be able to enjoy one of these 8-week online specialization training programs valued between 1,300 and 1,800 euros which will begin in September.

• Parametric design with Visual Programming in BIM
• Arquitectura sostenible. Green Building & Construction
• Diseño y cálculo estructural de una nave industrial 
• Diseño y construcción con madera
• Boosting Innovation

From Zigurat Global Institute of Technology, we want to thank all participants for their time and creativity. We hope that the winners will enjoy their awards and wait forward to seeing you all in the launch of the virtual building.