The Stephen Lawrence Prize shortlist for 2012 has been announced. The winner will be announced at the RIBA Stirling Prize Dinner in Manchester on Saturday 13 October.
The RIBA Stephen Lawrence Prize is funded by the Marco Goldschmied Foundation, and was set up in memory of the teenager who was setting out on the road to becoming an architect when he was murdered in 1993.
The prize, which rewards the best examples of projects that have a construction budget of less than £1 million (€ 1.250.000), is intended to encourage fresh talent working with smaller budgets.
The 2012 Stephen Lawrence Prize shortlist is:
- The Dellow Day Centreby Featherstone Young
- Kings Grove by Duggan Morris Architects
- The Marquis Hotel & Restaurant by Guy Hollaway Architects
- Hill Top House by Adrian James Architects
- Hill House by Hampson Williams Architects
The Dellow Day Centre, London by Featherstone Young
This new building inserted into a narrow gap within the densely packed buildings and streets around Whitechapel provides workshop, studio, storage and office facilities for a charity working with homeless people.
Enclosed on three sides, the new building effectively has a single elevation fronting onto a courtyard. The body of the building is clad in yellow and green-coloured profiled steel panels with perforated screens.
This project demonstrates the benefits that a creative design approach can bring even within a modest budget.
Kings Grove, London by Duggan Morris Architects
This is a taut, exemplary response to the development of a landlocked site: an intelligent house built by an architect couple for themselves.
The house demonstrates a highly disciplined attention to detail in the design and the immaculate quality of the construction. All fitting out responds absolutely to the brick module of the enclosure. A simple palette of materials is employed - exposed brickwork, oak storage wall panels, stairs and flooring, and dark stained, timber-framed bespoke glazing.
The Marquis Hotel & Restaurant, Dover by Guy Hollaway Architects
Previously refurbished by the same architects, due to the success of the Grade II Listed restaurant ‘The Marquis’ has now been extended to provide additional hotel rooms, improved staff facilities and an enlarged kitchen.
The new building ties into its surroundings with the use of locally sourced flint and Kent Peg Tiles reclaimed from the demolished cottage that used to be on the site. A sedum roof also meshes it into the landscape. A fine example of good architecture engendering business success.
Hill Top House, Oxford by Adrian James Architects
The architects describe this scheme as ‘an essay in concrete for clients who relish the uncompromising ascetic quality of the material’
The four level house follows a rigorous plan with double volume corridors either side of a circulation and services core. Despite the small footprint, the abiding impression is one of space flowing in all directions.
The construction employs large precast panels for the party walls. This enabled the main structure to be built very quickly. Altogether a tour-de-force in urban residential design.
Hill House, Hampson by Hampson Williams Architects
The brief called for a house that reflected the environmental sensitivities of the client, was contemporary in design, honest in its expression both of form and material and rooted in place. As with all private houses the type of spaces and their arrangement is intensely personal, and the design process sought to be open, collaborative and flexible.
The house was conceived as a primarily timber construction. By using re-cycled excavation material as a retaining wall the carbon footprint was kept low and the project on budget. The beautifully crafted all plywood interior creates a simple, serene series of interconnected spaces. The ambitious in-situ welded steel stair is a dramatic sculptural element contrasting with the warmth of the plywood surrounding it on all sides.
