ScottishArchitecture.com

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) celebrated on Friday evening (27th June) the finest new architecture in Scotland by giving RIBA National Awards to BBC Scotland at Pacific Quay, Glasgow and to the Pier Arts Centre on Orkney.
 
The architecture of the new BBC Scotland building was described by the judges as having “seamlessly resolved technical, production, office-based and social functions within a singularly awe-inspiring building”.  The “extraordinary sensitivity” of the Pier Arts Centre has been achieved by extending the original Arts Centre through adding a new zinc and glass building which can be viewed from across the harbour.
 
The two buildings in Scotland that have won RIBA National Awards are (please see below for full citations):
BBC Scotland at Pacific Quay, Glasgow by David Chipperfield Architects Ltd
Pier Arts Centre, Stromness, Orkney by Reiach and Hall Architects
 
The RIBA National Awards were presented on Friday 27 June, at a dinner in London at the Hilton Hotel. The two winning Scottish projects join 14 other buildings across the UK in receiving an RIBA National Award, along with 10 RIBA European Award winners.  The Stirling Prize shortlist will be drawn from the 16 RIBA National Award winners, and the RIBA European Award winners which are eligible for the prize.  The shortlist will be announced on Thursday 17 July.

The RIBA Stirling Prize in association with The Architects’ Journal is awarded to the architects of the building that has made the greatest contribution to British architecture in the past year.  The £20,000 prize will be presented in Liverpool on Saturday 11 October 2008 and broadcast on Channel 4 on Sunday 12.
 
RIBA National Award winners, together with the winners of RIBA Awards, are also eligible for a series of special awards to be presented at the RIBA Stirling Prize.  For details of these and the other RIBA National winners please visit www.architecture.com/awards.
 
Speaking at the awards dinner RIBA President Sunand Prasad said:
“RIBA awards are only made to buildings that really work for their users. They are a studied response by architect and lay judges not only to the submitted material but most importantly to tours of buildings conducted by the clients and architects of the schemes. It is the thoroughness and rigour of the whole process that makes any tier of the RIBA awards scheme so worth winning.”
 
Arnie Dunn, President of the Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland, the RIBA’s sister institute, commented: “We have argued for a number of years now that Scotland’s architecture is of a quality that can compete with the best in Europe. The fact that two such distinctly different buildings at either end of the country have gained this recognition confirms that. The architects should be congratulated.”
 
The RIBA’s National Awards represent the best of this year’s RIBA Awards and are selected by the Awards Group on the basis of reports-back from the visiting juries.  The Awards Group, having already visited the shortlisted European schemes, will in July visit all 16 National Award winners before determining a shortlist of six for the RIBA Stirling prize in association with The Architects’ Journal.  These will in turn be visited by a third jury in September.