A group of NDSU students recently received honors at a theatre design competition for re-imagining NDSU’s Askanase Hall.

Theatre arts student Ben Wetzel and architecture students Mshail Ahmed, Dennis Bukowski, Britten Churchill and Ryan Linne won one of two honor awards, and the Commissioner’s Award (a people’s choice award) from the U.S. Institute of Theatre Technology’s Ideal Theatre Student Design Competition. The awards were presented at the institute’s annual conference in Milwaukee.

“Theatre design is considered challenging, in part, because theatres are characterized by a distinct combination of permanent conditions, and temporary, often insubstantial constructions such as stage-sets,” said Cindy Urness, associate professor of architecture and interim chair for the architecture and landscape architecture department.

The project was completed as part of the NDSU students’ third-year studio. It was started in the fall 2012 semester as an academic exercise under the joint direction of faculty members Mike Christenson, architecture; David Crutchfield, architecture; and Mark Engler, theatre arts. 

NDSU is recognized as one of the nation's top 108 public and private universities by the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education.