“Vitruvian Homer Simpson” wins FIU first place at sand-castle competition


FIU Landscape Architecture students took their talent to the beach on June 11 and won first place at the American Institute of Architects (AIA) Miami Sand-Castle Competition near Nikki Beach.

The university’s team chose a design inspired by Leonardo Da Vinci’s “Vitruvian Man,” giving it a modern-day twist in which the famous male figure was depicted by Homer Simpson. They named it “The Vitruvian Homer Simpson.”

Nine teams consisting of architects, engineers and students from local universities put aside their professional tools and brought out their beach buckets, pails and shovels to create works of art in the scorching hot sands of South Beach. With thousands of architects in Miami for the national AIA Convention, the teams had only a few hours, simple tools and some help from experienced sand sculptors to create their artwork with the sand.

“I feel that the outstanding instruction given by our professors about the landscape architecture profession is the starting point of all our future success,” said FIU Landscape Architecture student Joel Corbea. “What is most important is the demonstration of leadership and team collaboration that many of our professors eagerly stress, as well as the ability to tackle complex challenges and persevere, never surrendering to their high demand and strain.

“These [are the] qualities demonstrated in each one of our team members and what I feel made our project the most successful.”

FIU’s winning team was composed of Corbea, Luis Jiménez, Chelsi Rome, Damian Caballero, Eneida Pinon, Jeanne Canto, Ed Seymour and Nicolle Urbano.

Comments are closed.