#DeaArhitecturaAtHome Challenge:

Do you have more time at home? Would you like to explore the world of architecture and the built environment, discover the neighborhood, town or village where you live, even from your window, to enter fantastic worlds with towers with their heads in the clouds, to create houses for imaginary characters and many many more?

We invite you to accept our #DeaArhitecturaAtHome online challenges, to send us at any time your proposal by email at challenge@de-a-arhitectura.ro and to explore the galleries with the projects of all the children who participated, like you, in our challenges!

Challenge 16 #DeaArhitecturaAtHome: My Kind of House (details)

Until September 11th, 2023

While walking through the streets of your city or village, have you seen any buildings that attract you more than all the others? Buildings you’ve stopped by for quite some time, thinking that they might become your “home”, or imagining the lives of the people inside them? Houses that, if they were to wear clothes, like we do, you would share the same style with? Your kind of houses.

Sunny days are here and the De-a arhitectura team went for a walk with curious Ema and her grandmother Oma and rediscovered an architectural style similar to the two friends and to all those who love angular shapes: Bauhaus.

Bauhaus is still a super-modern style, although it was born more than 100 years ago, in Germany. Its name comes from Bau – to build and haus – house.

Many architects, painters, photographers, designers were part of this school that kept expanding to cities in Europe and beyond! Some Bauhaus buildings have round windows, facing the streets, others have longish windows, some buildings are really tall and look like a… steamboat, others have clear, straight lines, edgy volumes, rounded accents and many other details that help Ema and Oma recognise this style among the others, since is their kind of architecture.

We challenge you to be an archi-curious-guide and search through the city for the house with the details that suit you! Do your research! Put on your detective glasses and find out when it was built and how it differs from the Bauhaus style. Imagine and draw a pair-character for your house and put them together in a photo or collage! What elements do they have in common?

Send us the result and with the help of our friends from the German Embassy in Bucharest we will reward you for the virtual trip you took us on with the book “Ema and Oma”, playfully imagined and illustrated by Ioana Trușcă, a book to inspire and help you become an archi-guide too!

Challenge 15 #DeaArhitecturaAtHome: Sense your House! (details)

Have you noticed the way buildings get dressed? Sometimes the clothes are thicker and sometimes lighter, sometimes they are matte, and sometimes glossy, sometimes grainy and sometimes soft.

Architects call them finishings and they can have different colors and temperatures or even different textures and smells, they can come in different shapes, whether we use them for the inside or outside of a building.

We challenge you to discover them and take a “different” look at the space around you! Explore each room of your home and re-discover it using not your sense of sight, but… your other senses!

Write down or draw all the moods inspired by the materials and name the corresponding rooms. Choose 5 of the most important sensations (fluffy, cold, slippery, scented, fresh) and search your home for materials or objects that make you think of them. Using all of these sensations, compose the image of the space you explored!

It will end up to be a very personal composition, the perfect picture of what transforms your house into a home.

Challenge 14 #DeaArhitecturaAtHome: Arch-happy Calendar (details)

December is near with its festive days and we are getting ready to gather at home, around the Christmas tree! Children, parents, grandparents, cousins, friends and colleagues – we remember Christmas traditions, the joy of time spent together.

While we enjoy each day that passes and brings us closer to the holidays, why not count the days with a special calendar? We challenge you to create, alone, as a family or even with your classmates, an… arch-happy calendar!

To make the joy even greater, sneak into the calendar small little things, jokes, surprises, challenges, riddles, rhymes or sweets for your loved ones or even a gift of yours for yourselves.

The best riddle is a lock,
That can cause the door to block.
Try the answer,
Try once more,
If you want
to unlock the door.

Explore the projects sent in by the kids in Romania: Calendar arhi-bucuros: ne amintim de veselia din decembrie

Challenge 13 #DeaArhitecturaAtHome: Carnival Cities (details)

Challenge 12 #DeaArhitecturaAtHome: Casting the Building (details)

Do you like movies? Are you passionate about architecture? Do you love to create new and cool things?

We want you: film buffs, architecture lovers, creatives!

Have you ever wondered where some scenes from your favorite movie or TV show were filmed? Has a building, an interior, a street or a city seen in a movie marked you? Just by looking at a certain building or interior can you guess which period or architectural style it belongs to? Have you ever loved the setting of a sci-fi movie scene so much that you put your pen to paper and drew the fantastical worlds created there?

Impress us with your expert eye and call us into your movie!

Challenge 11 #DeaArhitecturaAtHome: Monument, who are you? (details)

Do you know what a historical monument is? How many types of monuments are there, how do you recognize them and where do you look for such buildings? And how does a building become an architectural monument and why/how is it important?

We challenge you to look for and to choose a historical monument building as close as possible to the area where you live in and to make a calling card for it. How? Find as much information as possible about it and listen to what the building is telling you or even to what those who know the story of the building say about it. Draw its portrait, write its story and create a symbol to mark the value of these precious buildings.

Challenge 10 #DeaArhitecturaAtHome: Comics about inflated characters. Oh, and the deflated ones (details)

Would you like to invent your own comics, like the ones you see in comic books or magazines? Imagine that your own characters would be the superheroes of a special story you yourself would create!

We challenge you to draw a comic about three characters with different proportions talking about… The Fibonacci Sequence! Imagine the conversation between them and how challenging it will be (or not) to use the objects around them. If you are curious to find out more, come and see what we’ve prepared!

Explore the projects sent in by the kids in Romania: Desenăm din nou simpatice benzi desenate cu personaje umflate…

Challenge 9 #DeaArhitecturaAtHome: Creative recycling in your room/background for everything online (details)

Are you a bit bored with your room after so much time spent at home? Do you, maybe, meet your friends online? Do you have a YouTube Channel, vlog or do you stream your games?

We challenge you to make your own DIY background for your online activities, using creative recycling techniques for your room, at home!

Challenge 8 #DeaArhitecturaAtHome: Cities with water streets (details)

Would you like to live in a city crossed by many water canals? What about in a city embraced by water? If you were a street in the city you imagined, how would your buildings look like? If you were a house, what materials would you wear to be waterproof? If you were an inhabitant of the city, how would you get around?

Imagine your own water embraced city in which you would like to live. We challenge you to draw a tourist map of your imaginary city! Draw or write the story of the city the way you want to present it to a visiting friend. Don’t forget to name the city!

Explore the projects sent in by the kids in Romania: Aventuri noi din orașele cu străzi pe ape

Challenge 7 #DeArhitecturaAtHome: Traveling House (details)

Would you like to travel around the world like Phileas Fogg and Passepartout did, the two characters from Jules Verne’s novel who went around the world in 80 days? What if instead of traveling by train, car or plane you could take your house on a road trip? This way you can visit the enchanted cities we discovered… or any other city imagined by you!

Explore the projects sent in by the kids in Romania: Traveling House

Challenge 6 #DeArhitecturaAtHome: Reinvent your school (details)

The summer holiday is over! Did you miss school? Would you like to return to school the way it was before the pandemic time? This fall we challenge you to reinvent your school! Be creative and choose a visual that fits you and your idea!

Explore the projects sent in by the kids in Romania: Reinvent your school: școala ca spațiu tămăduitor

Challenge 5 #DeArhitecturaAtHome: Obstacle Course (details)

Do you like to ride on wheels? On your bike, skateboard or inlines? To jump over obstacles at great speed? But what if you ALWAYS had to ride on wheels?

What do you think, is there enough space for us all on the sidewalk? We challenge you to go out riding on wheels, but different from those you are used to, and thus experience your town.

Challenge 4 #DeaArhitecturaAtHome: Animal-inspired chairs (details)

Back in 1945, Charles and Ray Eames, two famous and super-creative designers imagined and built an elephant plywood chair for kids, being inspired by those fascinating animals. We challenge you to do the same! Imagine and build a miniature model of a kid chair inspired by your favourite animal, using the right materials! Whether it is a lion, panda bear, zebra, dog, cat, penguin or even a charmeleon, any animal you love can be the inspiration for your chair if you are using your imagination.

Explore the projects sent in by the kids in Romania: Animal-inspired chairs

Challenge 3 #DeaArhitecturaAtHome: Castles for birds (details)

Have you ever wondered where little birds live? Or how do they manage to build their shelter? Did you know that humans also build nests for themselves? Using rods of any kind we challenge you to build a castle! Keep in mind it has to be small, perfectly-tailored for your bird and as strong as a real house!

Explore the projects sent in by the kids in Romania: Castles for birds: playful nests

Challenge 2 #DeaArhitecturaAtHome: 100+ Streetviews (details)

Where does the city of the future begin? Why not… right from your street? Inspired by those who knew how to travel in time through their imagination and their distinctive ideas, we challenge you to discover the whole story of the street you live on and to take it, through drawing, far, far away in time.

Explore the projects sent in by the kids in Romania: 100+ Streetviews: past and future streets

Challenge 1 #DeaArhitecturaAtHome: Towers with their heads in the clouds (details)

Have you ever imagined what it would be like to live in a tall tower, so high that it could reach the clouds, like the bean stalk of Jack the Brave? Inspired by architects who compete to create buildings with as many floors as possible (i.e. skyscrapers), as tall and solid as possible and with the most intricate shapes, we challenge you to imagine and build such a tower with its head in the clouds, give it a name (any decent building has a name!) that is as suggestive as possible (in relation to what is happening inside) and draw or write a short story with or about your tower and those who live with their head in clouds.

Explore the projects sent in by the kids in Romania:
Towers with their heads in the clouds
A different sort of towers with their heads in the clouds