Drafting Dreams : Platypus Habitat Design Nets Student a Scholarship

A Laguna Beach teen-ager is off to architecture school in New York, expenses paid, all because of duckbilled platypuses.

David Dike, 18, a drafting enthusiast at Laguna Beach High School, won a $35,000 scholarship to Pratt Institute for his design of a luxury habitat for the web-toed, beaver-tailed platypus.

Dike was the winner in the architecture school’s annual nationwide talent search, which required entrants to design a habitat for some animal.

He said his drafting instructor of four years, Ed Bowen, found out about the contest and suggested that he enter. Also at Bowen’s suggestion, Dike decided on a platypus refuge because of the architectural possibilities. “They live in both land and water,” he said. “That way you can pull off a lot of neat things.”

The dark brown mammals, which grow to about two feet long and weigh from two to four pounds, are native to eastern Australia and Tasmania and are distinguished by their leathery, duck-like beaks.

The open-air sanctuary Dike designed in the space of about two weeks would spoil any platypus, although the contest entries are not really intended to be built. The sanctuary would be about the size of a football field and would include three waterfalls, a lake, a stream, a few ponds, and an island for the animals to play on. It also would include an observation deck and underwater walkway for people.

The blueprints Dike mailed were among 55 entries, and he faced a one-month wait. Then he was notified that he had made the first cut.

“Oh, God! I was so tense! But I made the finals and I was really stoked,” he said. “That was an accomplishment, and I went on from that,” he said.

Then he designed six new sketches, had them mounted on a plastic sheet, and sent them off.

“It was right in the middle of finals at school. I was having a kind of hard time concentrating,” he said. “I couldn’t even think about school.”

A month later, just as he was weeding through college applications, he got the call that he remembers as one of the happiest moments of his life. Not only had he been chosen one of four scholarship winners, but his designs were judged the best, the Pratt spokesman told him.

Although he is looking forward to college, Dike said, it will mean a few less weeks of beach volleyball. The institute’s orientation begins Aug. 26. “It’ll be a short summer.”

But, he said, “I’ve got it all in front of me now. All I have to do is grab it. It’s all out there waiting.”