The Ladybird Hotel Competition was organized February 1st, ending on April 1st, as a garden themed competition targeted to a general audience; mainly to students and artists in Lebanon. There was no fee to participate, those interested were asked to fill a form to sign up. They had to give their name and job or position before they submit. Afterwards, Beata and Ranim worked on setting up guidelines to help direct the flow of work and ladybird hotel results. Two months were given to the participants to construct their ladybird hotels. Jury members were chosen to be entomologists, journalists, mycologists, nature enthusiasts, and landscape architects. The jury team thus consisted of Samar Mogharbel, Fady Daw, Patricia Khodr, Nadine Modad, Khouzama Knio, Cornelie Krafft, Randa Halabi, Anis Abdallah, and Beata Dreksler. Participants submitted their work to AUBotanic and the hotels were kept in a closed room until the Jury members came after 1 month. A 1st, 2nd, and 3rd winner was decided.
The variety of participants was what made this competition so interesting, there were landscape students, architects, graphic designers, artists, and even families with children who participated. It was a wonderful experience for all. A huge number of participants signed up (107 individuals, 60 groups) but only 30 groups have submitted hotels.
A second children's competition was organized to divide the children from the adults as it was considered unfair and as a result, 7 more ladybird hotels were submitted. After some participants vouched to take their hotels back, we ended up with 15 remaining ladybird hotels.
Link to the competition page: build-ladybird-refuge.aspx