RIBA｜The Presidents Medals Student Awards 2021
The President's Medals History
Established in 1836 when the Institute of British Architects awarded the first Silver Medal to George Godwin for his essay on the 'Nature and Properties of Concrete', the President's Medals are the RIBA’s oldest awards and are regarded as the most prestigious prizes in architectural education globally.
The current format of the awards dates to 1986, when at the celebration of their 150th anniversary, the Institute replaced a large number of student awards, scholarships and prizes with the Bronze and Silver Medals to reward outstanding design work at RIBA Part 1 and Part 2. In 2001, a Dissertation Medal was added to reward accomplished written work.
Participation is by direct invitation only to over 500 schools of achitecture located in 100 countries. Schools are invited to nominate up to 2 entries for the Bronze Medal, up to 2 entries for the Silver Medal, and 1 entry for the Dissertation Medal. In 2024, a record 372 entries were received from 118 schools located in 36 countries.
The winners receive their awards from the RIBA President at a ceremony in December of each year. This coincides with the opening of an exhibition of entries that also tours throughout the UK and internationally.
Over the last few years, this showcase of talented student work has been exhibited in countries such as Argentina, Australia, Bulgaria, Chile, China, Colombia, Egypt, Finland, France, Hong Kong, India, Ireland, Kuwait, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates.
Awards are made in the following categories:
- RIBA Dissertation Medal
- RIBA Bronze Medal
- RIBA Silver Medal
In addition, the judging panels of the Bronze and Silver Medals are tasked with selecting the winners of the Serjeant Awards for Excellence in Architectural Drawing and of the RIBA Awards for Sustainable Design, at both Part I and at Part II.
2021 Silver Medal Winner
NO.1 The Cloud Cooperative
Part 2 Project 2021
Tiia Partanen University of Strathclyde | UK
We are on the verge of a Big Data Revolution: all facets of society are beginning to be shaped by data mining and behaviour products - constant mass surveillance, in the form of online tracking, is dangerously close to becoming the ‘new normal.’ Today, in the Web 2.0., private corporations and powerful governments hold a monopoly over all flows of information – by owning the infrastructure of the internet (the data centres, the broadband networks, the ISPs) they own the data. With our private information sold to the highest bidder and with one person’s yearly email correspondence costing 0.6 tonnes in carbon dioxide – the system, as we know it, requires an overhaul. At its core, the commoditization of data has created a fundamental asymmetry in power between institutions and individuals: this project seeks to challenge the current data monopoly and to explore what it would mean to give people power over their own data. Envisioned through the actions of a future activist movement, called the Cloud Cooperative, the project explores the phased decentralization of data infrastructure and the creation of a secure, ethical new internet.
Tiia Partanen
Tutor(s)Ewan ImrieLizzie Smith
NO.2 An Art School in Enugu
Finian Reece-Thomas
Kingston University Kingston | UK
This project has developed from a reading of the novel Purple Hibiscus by Chimimanda Ngozi Adichie. Set in post-colonial Enugu, Nigeria, the book tells the story of a country troubled by its hierarchical power structures such as those of politics, religion and the family unit. The inherent tension between tradition and modernity is explicated through the protagonist, Kambili, who finds liberation from her complex childhood environment in the progressive household of her auntie. This project, set in an imagined future on from the book, sees characters of the story establish a non-hierarchical institution for the teaching of creative disciplines in Enugu.
The proposal sees the radical reuse of an existing 1960s tower, transformed into a new institution for the teaching of art in central Enugu. The architectural language of the project has explored ideas of textiles and weaving in both an attitude towards space as well as towards the tectonics of the building fabric - an approach guided by the challenging climate of south eastern Nigeria. Informed by both the pre-colonial palaces of western Africa and the compound house typology specific to much of urban Africa, the school utilises low embodied carbon materials and employs a range of passive environmental strategies to construct a spatially fluid and environmentally sustainable institution that provides the infrastructure for a new form of cultural reproduction in Enugu.
Finian Reece-Thomas
Tutor(s)Andrew ClancyLaura Evans
NO.3 The Earthen Land Registry
Part 2 Project 2021
Daniel Pope
Bartlett School of Architecture (UCL) | UK
London Clay plays a distinguished role in the rich architectural history of London and has now largely disappeared as a living industry. The Earthen Land Registry, a circular resource system, is proposed, producing new London Clay architectures using emerging technologies and tailored to current environmental sustainability priorities. Clay is sourced from local construction and engineering project waste streams, including the Thames Tideway Tunnel and city super-basements, diverting it from landfill. It is stored in the Greater London area, processed into tailored components including insulative extruded bricks, and used for on-site additive manufacturing. The range of proposals aim to heighten the sensuous and tactile relationship between the body and the materials of our built environment.The ‘Earthen House’ typology has a protective, fired envelope with a long lifespan, and tailored interiors that are 3D printed on-site with clay. The potency of bringing new London Clay systems back to historic London Brick architecture is investigated in the ‘Earthen Blanket’ retrofit strategy, augmenting existing buildings, opening new architectural opportunities, and upgrading performance whilst not compromising the existing building or reducing its lifespan. The proposals are carefully tailored to contribute to London’s migration to net-zero carbon whilst evolving its architecture in the process.
Daniel Pope
Tutor(s)Matthew ButcherAna Monrabal-CookOliver Wilton
NO.4 Ruincarnation
Part 2 Project 2021
Janusz Moore
De Montfort University | UK
Ruincarnation responds to contemporary issues prompted by the political shift post-pandemic. As the UK adapts to these changes, breaking ties with the urban powerhouse, what might the nation look like during its shift back into rural society?This project looks to the UK’s rust belt as a new avenue for cohabitation and explores key challenges that come when dealing with historical sites subject to dereliction. What are the processes necessary to transform these sites to revive the industrial roots and forgotten communities that ground them? How should we respond to material decay to highlight issues of finiteness and celebrate historical value whilst developing sustainable systems for development?Like other rust-belt towns and cities, Stoke-on-Trent is defined by its industrial past. The slow decline in industry over the past 30 years has resulted in a parallel deformation of identity. Within its forgotten collieries, steelworks, and potteries, the buildings themselves are in a state of constant entropy, suffering a slow death with little functional purpose but to remind us of their past achievements.Utilising Chatterley Whitfield Colliery as its anchor site, the project aims to create a new industrial identity for the UK’s rust belt, whilst celebrating its golden era of production.
Janusz Moore
Tutor(s)Yuri HadiVasilena Vassileva
2019 RIBA Award for Sustainable Design
NO.1 Reclaiming Playtime
Part 2 Project 2021
Nicholas Honey
Robert Thackeray
Newcastle University | UK
Reclaiming Playtime introduces concepts of play and games into a mixed-use cultural space at the intersection between Edinburgh and Leith, the product of an evolving network of interconnected programmes, facilitated by a method of incremental expansion, consolidation, and shared resources.Using play as a mode of mapping generates a new dialogue surrounding the complex interrelationships in urban space, uncovering hidden narratives within the Pilrig area. Similarly, introducing play into the production and use of space gives agency to those within the community who have thus far been underrepresented: widening the discourse surrounding future development to provide a counterpoint to that observed historically and at present.Working together from the start as a joint thesis project, we aimed to produce a system of play that could allow us to both interact with the research and information within Edinburgh. As a result the role of play in our work has developed into a methodology that helps us learn from each other, and from the discussions we have together.
Nicholas HoneyRobert Thackeray
Tutor(s)Christos KakalisZeynep Kezer
Ivan Marquez Munoz
2019 Serjeant Award
NO.1 The Dalston Hub: A Vertical Market
Part 2 Project 2021
Elliott Ng Chan Kye Afoke
Oxford Brookes University Oxford | UK
The Dalston Hub is the beating heart of Hackney, run by traders’ activist, the vertical market proclaims a new social order and system of measure of trading in the expression of retaining and saving Ridley Road unique characters and culture.The project explores how Gentrification races through Dalston: luxury high rise developments on nearby Dalston Lane, Ridley Road Market faces mounting interest from developers to regenerate the market into luxury flats, retail, and offices, which currently see the market threatened with demolition, growing inequality suburbs and skyrocketing rents. The vertical market is self-sufficient, powered through the use of natural resource, the wind energy, placed on top of one another in stacked, each shop and stall are a typical urban pattern of Ridley Road buzzing street market that creates a vibrant sense of Old hackney’s community. As the protest demonstrates, the vertical market structure grows out of the old and has the potential of reclamation of the right to the city.
Elliott Ng Chan Kye Afoke
Tutor(s)Mr Toby Shew
