In an era when design tools have gone almost entirely digital, one annual competition at NC State’s College of Design insists on a different discipline — the kind that begins with a pencil, a pen, or a brush held in a human hand. The Brian Shawcroft Drawing Competition, now in its 31st year, remains a rare and deliberate celebration of hand drawing as a core architectural skill.

This year, four students received prizes for submissions evaluated across three categories: the design process, documentation and analysis, and presentation. The breadth of those categories reflects the competition’s central belief that hand drawing is not a single technique but a spectrum of thinking made visible.

This year’s jury included Patricia Morgado, Associate Professor Emerita of Architecture at NC State; Don Kranbuehl, Principal at Clark Nexsen; and Kiley Blades, Designer at SfL+a Architects. The competition was organized by Assistant Professors of Architecture Jeremy Leonard and Donghwan Moon.

Winning Entries

First Place: Raina Markulis

Second Place: Spencer Witt

Third Place: Sara Allen

Honorable Mention: Gray Hancock

Additional Photos from the Competition

See additional photos from the competition in our Flickr Gallery:

The Legacy of Brian Shawcroft

The competition draws its name and its spirit from Brian Shawcroft, AIA (1929–2017), a modernist architect, photographer, and professor at what was then known as NC State’s School of Design, where he taught from 1960 to 1968. Shawcroft was widely admired for his architectural sketches and renderings across varied media, as well as for his facility with the human figure.

In 1991, he received the Henry Kamphoefner Prize in recognition of his contributions to the Modern Movement in architecture. Three years later, in 1994, he used his own generosity to establish the juried prize that bears his name — a gift intended to keep hand drawing alive in the curriculum and in the culture of architectural education.