Buildings of Excellence - Early Design Support

The Buildings of Excellence Early Design Support Request for Proposal (the “Early Design Support RFP”) seeks Proposals for qualified design firms that will provide early-stage design support for new construction, adaptive reuse, and gut rehabilitation multifamily projects that will be clean and resilient and achieve carbon neutral-ready performance while being beautiful and functional, and will provide healthy, safe, comfortable, and resilient living spaces for their occupants. Projects that will be profitable for their developers and owners and demonstrate realistic cost reductions in the design and construction of clean and resilient buildings, may also be eligible for early design support funding. The Early Design Support RFP is part of and in support of the larger Buildings of Excellence Competition (the “Competition”). Successful design firm Partner Proposers to the Early Design Support RFP must demonstrate how their design firm has engaged with prior projects and will engage

with projects in the future to substantially reduce energy use, while increasing building resiliency, successfully integrating architectural design attributes, and improving health, comfort, safety, and productivity for occupants, in a manner that can be replicated at scale.Partners must also commit to publicly share information related to the project’s design, costs, and performance relied on to support the decision-making processes employed to achieve the desired outcomes.Through this Early Design Support RFP, selected design Partners are eligible to receive up to $1.50/square foot in direct funding per project up to a cap of $100,000 per project, for early-stage clean, resilient, and carbon neutral-ready design support, as well as support for initiatives focused on broad marketing and public awareness.Design firm Partner Proposers must demonstrate (1) competence in clean, resilient, and carbon neutral-ready design that is coupled with architectural design quality and innovation, (2) ability to deliver high quality and functional, clean, resilient, and carbon neutral-ready multifamily projects at competitive costs, with superior performance, (3) how their projects generate interest in and demand for the design, construction, and operation of clean, resilient, and carbon neutral-ready buildings, and (4) their commitment to share information related to the project’s design, costs, and performance to support the decision-making processes employed to achieve the desired outcomes.The Early Design Support RFP will accept project proposals from approved design firm Partners to provide early design stage services to projects that are, as of the date of the Project Proposal’s submission to NYSERDA, in an early design status as defined and detailed in the Eligibility Section II of this RFP. Design firm Partners must demonstrate that the design strategies of their early design support projects are replicable, scalable, and have the potential to achieve broad-based adoption within their own business practices and by other design teams, developers, and consumers. The Early Design Support RFP intends to identify and select project proposals from design firm Partners that demonstrate the greatest potential for success and replication in the market.