COTE® Top Ten Award
The AIA COTE® Top Ten Award is the industry’s best-known award program for sustainable design excellence.
Celebrating sustainable design excellence
The Committee on the Environment (COTE®) Top Ten award program, now in its 28th year, was founded on the idea that sustainability is essential to design excellence and vice versa. The COTE® Top Ten has become the industry’s best-known award program recognizing innovative projects integrating exemplary performance with compelling design.
Entrants
- Any U.S. licensed architect may enter.
- On team projects, the architect submitting the entry doesn’t have to be the head of the team but must be a noted major contributor to the project.
- Submitting firms must have signed the AIA 2030 Commitment.
Projects
- Completed new buildings, renovations, restorations, interior architecture, and urban/regional plans are eligible.
- Projects may be located anywhere in the world.
- Projects must have been completed at least twelve months prior to the submission deadline, with no additional age-related restrictions.
- You may submit multiple entries.
Each entry is evaluated by the Jury on how successfully the project meets its individual requirements, with particular emphasis on design excellence, including a sense of place and purpose, of community and history, performance, aesthetics, community connection and resilience, and stewardship of the natural environment. Projects are evaluated through the Framework for Design Excellence which seeks to inform progress toward a zero-carbon, equitable, resilient, and healthy built environment, and is comprised of 10 Principles: Design for Integration, Equitable Communities, Ecosystems, Water, Economy, Energy, Wellbeing, Resources, Change, and Discovery.
For a detailed list of submission criteria, fees, and required information, download the 2024 AIA COTE Top Ten Sample Application.
Questions? Please see the Honor & Awards FAQ.
2024
Nadine Saint-Louis, AIA, Chair, McHarry Associates, Miami
Yu-Ngok Lo, FAIA, YNL Architects, Culver City, Calif.
Jack Rusk, Assoc. AIA, EHDD, San Francisco
Eddy Santosa, AIA, Mott MacDonald, Los Angeles
2023 winners
Casa Adelante 2060 Folsom, Mithun with Y.A. Studio, San Francisco
Confluence Park, Lake Flato Architects+ Matsys, San Antonio, Texas
DPR Sacramento Zero Net Energy Office, SmithGroup, Sacramento, Calif.
Harvard University Science and Engineering Complex, Behnisch Architekten, Boston
John W. Olver Transit Center, Charles Rose Architects, Greenfield, Mass.
RIDC Mill 19: Buildings A & B, MSR Design with R3A Architecture, Pittsburgh, Pa.
Science and Environmental Center, Leddy Maytum Stacy Architects, Hillsborough, Calif.
UC San Diego North Torrey Pines Living & Learning Neighborhood, HKS, Inc. & Safdie Rabines Architects, San Diego
Watershed, Weber Thompson, Seattle
Westwood Hills Nature Center, HGA Architects and Engineers, St. Louis Park, Minn.
Past winners
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