The Connected City Design Challenge will present a monthlong lecture series at the Dallas Museum of Art to highlight bold solutions by internationally acclaimed architects to guide the future development and connection between downtown Dallas and the Trinity River.

The first event of the series will introduce the goals of The Challenge and its internationally acclaimed jury. The Connected City Design Challenge Jury will discuss the Professional Team design proposals. The discussion will be led by Jury Chair Larry Beasley, Retired Chief Planner, Vancouver, BC, with Jury members Allan Jacobs, Professor Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley and former San Francisco Director of Planning; Peter Bishop, Prof. of Urban Design, Bartlett School of Architecture, London; and Robert Meckfessel, FAIA, Chair of the City of Dallas Urban Design Peer Review Panel.

The Connected City Design Challenge finalists include the Barcelona-based studio Ricardo Bofill Taller de Arquitectura; OMA-AMO, the architectural office and research division of Rotterdam architect Rem Koolhaas, and Stoss Landscape Urbanism of Boston with SHoP Architects of New York.

As part of this special program, The Connected City Design Challenge will mark the event with a design installation on the Museum’s Ross Avenue Plaza that will house models for each of the three designs inside a 45-foot metal shipping container. The installation will debut on Thursday, October 17, in advance of the jury discussion that same evening, and will remain on view through November 11, 2013. After its DMA presentation, the container installation is scheduled to appear at several locations throughout the city, including Main Street Garden, Dallas City Hall Plaza, and along the Trinity River levee, to further build awareness for the challenge.