RIBA Regional Awards 2021

For 50 years the RIBA awards and prizes have championed and celebrated the best architecture in the UK and around the world, no matter the form, size or budget.

We were excited to support the awards for a fourth year through our national sponsorship of the 'Project Architect of the Year' award category. The 2021 awards were carried over from the postponed 2020 awards and have provided a variety of innovative and interesting winning projects.

RIBA East Midlands Project Architect of the Year Award Winner:
Iris Papadatou - Featherstone Young for Stonecrop

Stonecrop is a sustainable, confident and playful house set amongst thoughtful and sensitive landscaping on a backland site in a village setting in Rutland.

To find out more about this project, click here.

RIBA South Project Architect of the Year Award Winner:
Martin Nässén - 6a Architects for MK Gallery

This is a challenging project that has been beautifully crafted. A high level of research, interrogation, collaboration and consultation from an enthusiastic team has delivered a building and facility that remains true to the ethos of the original masterplan and aesthetic.

To find out more about this project, click here.

RIBA Yorkshire Project Architect of the Year Award Winner:
Steve Gittner - Gagarin Studio Limited for Thorney Barn

Thorney Barn repurposes an old barn into a family home which is located on a south facing hillside, making the most of fantastic distant views. The main barn has been repaired externally with a small extension to provide a gym, office, sauna and plant room. The selection of materials for this new addition is a combination of traditional stonework and metal cladding, which effectively breaks up the mass on the southern elevation.

To find out more about this project, click here.

RIBA West Midlands Project Architect of the Year Award Winner:
The Nicholas Hare Team - Nicholas Hare Architects for King's High School, Warwick

This submission includes four buildings on the same school campus designed and delivered in close succession by Nicholas Hare Architects.

The buildings have been designed by the same hand and are clearly a family. A humble material palette employed both internally and externally relates these projects, as does a consistency in design quality and rigour. Throughout the project there is careful thought given to the articulation of natural light and views. The buildings have been designed from the inside out, giving great thought to the function of each space, both environmentally and acoustically.

To find out more about this project, click here.

RIBA South East Project Architect of the Year Award Winner:
Kate McGechan - Haverstock for Linden Farm Autism Supported Living

There are five buildings at Linden Farm to provide supported living to ten young adults with autism and assistance of supported living care with two members of staff to each resident.

The principles of inclusive design are embedded in every detail of this project, to create a safe yet homely environment for the tenants who have complex sensory needs.

To find out more about this project, click here.

RIBA North East Project Architect of the Year Award Winner:
David Pogson - Group Ginger for The BIS, Whitby Street Studios

Group Ginger have repurposed the wonderful northern renaissance style Grade II listed Post Office in the centre of Hartlepool. The original Post Office has been treated with respect, but also rejuvenated with a sympathetic restoration and extension which adds a sense of playfulness, externally signalling a new life for the building and providing a new focus for the surrounding conservation area and town.

To find out more about this project, click here.

RIBA East Project Architect of the Year Award Winner:
Matthew Wingrove - Marks Barfield Architects for Cambridge Central Mosque

The defining internal characteristic of the mosque is the timber ‘trees’ which form the structural support for the roof and the rooflights. The geometry of the trees was developed through work with geometric artist, Keith Critchlow, creating the underlying geometry of the mosque. It combines an Islamic ‘the Breath of the Compassionate’ pattern into a structural grid that supports the roof and is then brought to a point at the columns. It is a simple device that combines the structural logic of supporting a large span with few columns and a celebration of the structural material and its decorative possibilities, bringing to mind both Fosters’ Stansted Airport, and Kings College Chapel.

To find out more about this project, click here.

RIBA South West Project Architect of the Year Award Winner:
Martina Goluchova - Barefoot Architects for Corten Courtyard House

This house is on an end of terrace triangular plot in inner-city St Werburgh’s, Bristol. It is an intensely urban spot, bounded on one side by a busy street and on another by a public footpath alongside a park containing mature plane trees, one of which overhangs the site. The client spotted it from her daughter’s house next door when it was an empty yard surrounded by a high brick wall covered in graffiti. The wall and the graffiti remain, whilst within it, the small and very difficult site has been exploited with considerable aplomb to create a delightful home.

To find out more about this project, click here.

RIBA London Project Architect of the Year Award Winner:
Gurmeet Sian - Office Sian Architecture + Design for Phoenix Garden Community Building

Opened to the public in 1984, Phoenix Garden is the last of the Covent Garden community gardens. Tucked away close to the busy Shaftsbury Avenue on the site of a World War 2 bomb crater, it is surrounded by tall developments.

The brief was to develop a community building that not only facilitates the public enjoyment of the garden but broadcasts the client’s ambition to provide ‘sustainable, community and free-to-access green spaces to the city’.

To find out more about this project, click here.

Alongside the project architect winners, a number of fantastic projects have won RIBA regional awards. To view the full list of 2021 winners, click here.