Among U.S. prizes for architecture and urban planning, the Rudy Bruner Award is unique in providing funds for programming and development of projects that support placemaking and social health. This year’s finalists range from housing and rehabilitation facilities to job training initiatives to new public spaces from across the country. The Gold Medal winner will receive $50,000, while Silver Medals winners each receive $10,000. 

This year’s finalists are:

Inspiration Kitchens
Chicago, IL
Submitted by Inspiration Corporation

An 80-seat restaurant providing free meals to working poor families and market-rate meals to the public as well as workforce training and placement.

Congo Street Initiative (pictured at top)
Dallas, TX
Submitted by buildingcommunityWORKSHOP

The sustainable rehabilitation of five houses and street infrastructure along with construction of a new home that provided transitional housing, in collaboration with resident families.

Louisville Waterfront Park
Louisville, KY
Submitted by Louisville Waterfront Development Corporation

An 82-acre urban park developed over more than two decades that reconnects the city with the Ohio River.

The Steel Yard
Providence, RI
Submitted by Klopfer Martin Design Group

The redevelopment of an abandoned, historic steel fabrication facility into a campus for arts education, workforce training, and small-scale manufacturing.

Via Verde
Bronx, NY
Submitted by Jonathan Rose Companies and Phipps Houses

A 222-unit, LEED Gold, affordable housing development in the Bronx designed as a model for healthy and sustainable urban living.

Jurors include Mick Cornett, Mayor of Oklahoma City, Ann Coulter of A. Coulter Consulting, landscape architect Walter Hood, Cathy Simon of Perkins + Will in San Francisco, Susan Szenasy, Editor-in-Chief of Metropolis, and Jane Werner, executive director of the Pittsburg Children’s Museum.