Second Annual Paper Airplane Challenge

Nothing like some friendly competition to kick off the weekend as Niles Bolton Associates hosted its second annual Paper Airplane Challenge! The stakes were high in the Atlanta and DC offices with over 40 participants (full-time NBAers and summer interns). This year’s awards included 1st and 2nd Place for the farthest flyers, Most Beautiful Design and Most Hideous Design. There was no shortage of creativity used when NBAers made their paper airplanes, following the brief guidelines of DYE | NBA Aviation President and Event Sponsor Mercer Dye that stated “cheating is encouraged.”

How do you fly these things, Chris Fortner?

People in the Atlanta office approached the contest with fierce determination. Sporting sunglasses indoors to psych out his opponents, Director of Landscape Architecture Chris Fortner returned with his cylindrical shaped plane from last year’s competition and a new paper aircraft model. Sadly, neither design won him an award. Others like Principal Rowan Stewart showed up with a classic paper airplane, which ended up paying off as he claimed first place! Designer Lydia Hagel followed closely behind in second place with an innovative UFO design that earned some side eyes from the crowd (does a UFO count as a paper airplane?), but Dye’s “No Rules Policy” was her saving grace. Lydia would like to share her win with colleague Dustin Willis who drew up the original plans for the design.

After each contestant flew their plane, it was time for NBAers to vote on the Most Beautiful/Hideous Design awards. Dye went above and beyond to make the competition fair with his free-trial sound metric app that conveniently crashed when it came time to measure the volume of the crowd’s applause. Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on how you see it) no one won the Most Hideous Design award and instead, the Most Beautiful Design award was given to two recipients, Rebecca Ferrara and Jake Gamberg!

Flying over to the DC office, competition heated up as they upped the ante with only two prizes: Farthest Distance and Best Design. For Summer Intern Morgan McGee, it was all about having a strategy. “I was very excited that I won Farthest Distance!” exclaimed McGee. “I picked an airplane design that was compact and sturdy to maximize its aerodynamics.” Aesthetics-wise, Architecture Associate Sarah Violi had everyone beat, and she won Best Design!