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Billion-pound Foster vies with mud-walled burial ground for Stirling prize Billion-pound Foster vies with mud-walled burial ground for Stirling prize
(6 months later)
The most expensive office building in the land will go head to head with a mud-walled cemetery and a brick nursery school in the battle to win the 2018 RIBA Stirling prize, awarded to the best new building in the UK. They are joined by the stealthy extension to the Tate St Ives gallery, student halls for the University of Roehampton and a teaching facility for Worcester College, Oxford, in a shortlist that favours the understated over the spectacular.The most expensive office building in the land will go head to head with a mud-walled cemetery and a brick nursery school in the battle to win the 2018 RIBA Stirling prize, awarded to the best new building in the UK. They are joined by the stealthy extension to the Tate St Ives gallery, student halls for the University of Roehampton and a teaching facility for Worcester College, Oxford, in a shortlist that favours the understated over the spectacular.
Norman Foster’s £1bn HQ for Bloomberg, in the City of London, is the Goliath on the list, a media palace of stone and bronze stuffed with bespoke fixtures and energy-saving gadgets. Its ceilings are studded with 2.5m polished aluminium petals, serving as light fittings, sound baffles and coolers, and chilled by water from above, while magnetic wooden floorboards lift to provide access to cables beneath.Norman Foster’s £1bn HQ for Bloomberg, in the City of London, is the Goliath on the list, a media palace of stone and bronze stuffed with bespoke fixtures and energy-saving gadgets. Its ceilings are studded with 2.5m polished aluminium petals, serving as light fittings, sound baffles and coolers, and chilled by water from above, while magnetic wooden floorboards lift to provide access to cables beneath.
The architects even developed a new kind of cantilevered elevator that shuttles people up and down in glass boxes using a concealed forklift mechanism. It is a tour de force of clever engineering, but it’s also a lumbering hulk, greeting the street with chubby columns and oversized bronze window baffles, which further block the view from inside the deep floors. It is an impressive testament to the fact that it is possible to throw too much money at a project and lose sight of the bigger picture.The architects even developed a new kind of cantilevered elevator that shuttles people up and down in glass boxes using a concealed forklift mechanism. It is a tour de force of clever engineering, but it’s also a lumbering hulk, greeting the street with chubby columns and oversized bronze window baffles, which further block the view from inside the deep floors. It is an impressive testament to the fact that it is possible to throw too much money at a project and lose sight of the bigger picture.
While Bloomberg’s HQ is hard to miss, Jamie Fobert’s extension to Tate St Ives – recently named museum of the year – is a surreptitious iceberg of a building, burying most of its bulk deep into its tight hillside site. Digging 15 metres down into the granite bedrock, the architect has deftly inserted a magical new gallery space, a 30-metre long hangar lit from above by great room-size light wells that filter the famous St Ives daylight through rows of deep concrete beams.While Bloomberg’s HQ is hard to miss, Jamie Fobert’s extension to Tate St Ives – recently named museum of the year – is a surreptitious iceberg of a building, burying most of its bulk deep into its tight hillside site. Digging 15 metres down into the granite bedrock, the architect has deftly inserted a magical new gallery space, a 30-metre long hangar lit from above by great room-size light wells that filter the famous St Ives daylight through rows of deep concrete beams.
The original Tate St Ives building was always an awkward beast; this project goes some way to fixing its problems, although the brutal relationship of a big blank wall facing on to a neighbouring development of sheltered housing leaves much to be desired.The original Tate St Ives building was always an awkward beast; this project goes some way to fixing its problems, although the brutal relationship of a big blank wall facing on to a neighbouring development of sheltered housing leaves much to be desired.
The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge appear on the shortlist this year with two beautifully crafted projects of a very different kind. Niall McLaughlin has made an elegant complex of an auditorium, a dance studio and teaching spaces in the Sultan Nazrin Shah Centre for Worcester College, Oxford, which stands like a sharp limestone temple on the edge of a cricket pitch.The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge appear on the shortlist this year with two beautifully crafted projects of a very different kind. Niall McLaughlin has made an elegant complex of an auditorium, a dance studio and teaching spaces in the Sultan Nazrin Shah Centre for Worcester College, Oxford, which stands like a sharp limestone temple on the edge of a cricket pitch.
From the plunging pleated roof of its fan-shaped auditorium, to the sprung-floored studio that looks out on to a lake, attention has been lavished on every detail – a level of care that was possible given the generous £9m budget. A dream brief for a dream client, could it be a little too bijou to take the Stirling?From the plunging pleated roof of its fan-shaped auditorium, to the sprung-floored studio that looks out on to a lake, attention has been lavished on every detail – a level of care that was possible given the generous £9m budget. A dream brief for a dream client, could it be a little too bijou to take the Stirling?
In Cambridge, the university is being honoured for its role as wider urban master-planner. The first civic building in its £1bn North West Cambridge city extension has been shortlisted, in the form of the Storey’s Field Community Centre and Nursery by MUMA architects. The building takes its cue from the college vernacular of cloisters and courts, with a central playground courtyard encircled by a lofty community hall and characterful nursery classrooms, their airy spaces rising to top-lit pyramidal ceilings.In Cambridge, the university is being honoured for its role as wider urban master-planner. The first civic building in its £1bn North West Cambridge city extension has been shortlisted, in the form of the Storey’s Field Community Centre and Nursery by MUMA architects. The building takes its cue from the college vernacular of cloisters and courts, with a central playground courtyard encircled by a lofty community hall and characterful nursery classrooms, their airy spaces rising to top-lit pyramidal ceilings.
The project is a hymn to the humble brick, used in an inventive variety of ways to form corduroy-like ridges, staggered openings around doorways and cosmic porthole windows. It is fun and playful, without resorting to the usually nursery default of stuck-on coloured plastic panels. MUMA missed out on the Stirling prize for their Whitworth Gallery in 2015. Might they snatch it this year?The project is a hymn to the humble brick, used in an inventive variety of ways to form corduroy-like ridges, staggered openings around doorways and cosmic porthole windows. It is fun and playful, without resorting to the usually nursery default of stuck-on coloured plastic panels. MUMA missed out on the Stirling prize for their Whitworth Gallery in 2015. Might they snatch it this year?
Bricks recur in a more sober form in Chadwick Hall, an ensemble of student accommodation buildings for Roehampton University, by architects Henley Halebrown. Set in the gardens of a Georgian villa, the three new blocks are an intelligent response to their context, synthesising the classical architecture of the original building and the modernist slabs of the postwar Alton West estate that neighbour it.Bricks recur in a more sober form in Chadwick Hall, an ensemble of student accommodation buildings for Roehampton University, by architects Henley Halebrown. Set in the gardens of a Georgian villa, the three new blocks are an intelligent response to their context, synthesising the classical architecture of the original building and the modernist slabs of the postwar Alton West estate that neighbour it.
The buildings exude a timeless air, with pinkish concrete lintels, dark red-brown bricks, and features including generous bay windows and arrow-head piers that make the project stand head and shoulders above most student accommodation, a sector often prone to mass-producing miserable stacks of tiny hutches.The buildings exude a timeless air, with pinkish concrete lintels, dark red-brown bricks, and features including generous bay windows and arrow-head piers that make the project stand head and shoulders above most student accommodation, a sector often prone to mass-producing miserable stacks of tiny hutches.
Finally, it is encouraging to see a cemetery on the Stirling prize shortlist for the first time, being the kind of building that is too often given to grim, utilitarian persuasion. Extending the UK’s most significant Jewish burial ground, a 16-acre site in the Hertfordshire green belt established in 1947, Waugh Thistleton architects have provided Bushey Cemetery with two new prayer halls and reception buildings, connected by a timber colonnade.Finally, it is encouraging to see a cemetery on the Stirling prize shortlist for the first time, being the kind of building that is too often given to grim, utilitarian persuasion. Extending the UK’s most significant Jewish burial ground, a 16-acre site in the Hertfordshire green belt established in 1947, Waugh Thistleton architects have provided Bushey Cemetery with two new prayer halls and reception buildings, connected by a timber colonnade.
Built from half-metre thick walls of rammed earth, dug from the site, the buildings have a quiet, monolithic presence, with the sequence of spaces carefully composed according to the processional nature of Orthodox Jewish burial practice. Weathered steel doors and oak-lined rooms bring a measured gravitas to the rituals of loss.Built from half-metre thick walls of rammed earth, dug from the site, the buildings have a quiet, monolithic presence, with the sequence of spaces carefully composed according to the processional nature of Orthodox Jewish burial practice. Weathered steel doors and oak-lined rooms bring a measured gravitas to the rituals of loss.
There is no single showstopper and it will be a difficult year for the judges, weighing up the varying shades of reticence on the list. Together, the buildings make a bit of a dull group, celebrating the mute and austere over the bold and expressive – repeating the tenor of last year’s list, which scandalously failed to include Herzog & de Meuron’s Tate Switch House.There is no single showstopper and it will be a difficult year for the judges, weighing up the varying shades of reticence on the list. Together, the buildings make a bit of a dull group, celebrating the mute and austere over the bold and expressive – repeating the tenor of last year’s list, which scandalously failed to include Herzog & de Meuron’s Tate Switch House.
Perhaps Amanda Levete’s £55m V&A courtyard extension would have made a more worthy contender than Foster’s Bloombergeum this year, bringing some variety with its acute angles and gleaming porcelain tiles. But it’s no masterpiece, either. As the Turner prize has shown in recent years, with its choice of young collective Assemble and now radical activist research agency Forensic Architecture, perhaps the more provocative work is happening elsewhere, flying beneath the decorous radar of the RIBA awards.Perhaps Amanda Levete’s £55m V&A courtyard extension would have made a more worthy contender than Foster’s Bloombergeum this year, bringing some variety with its acute angles and gleaming porcelain tiles. But it’s no masterpiece, either. As the Turner prize has shown in recent years, with its choice of young collective Assemble and now radical activist research agency Forensic Architecture, perhaps the more provocative work is happening elsewhere, flying beneath the decorous radar of the RIBA awards.
ArchitectureArchitecture
Stirling prizeStirling prize
The RIBAThe RIBA
Awards and prizesAwards and prizes
Norman FosterNorman Foster
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