No. 1 for nuns! Niall McLaughlin is one of architecture’s daredevils – and deserving of its highest award Build

WWhen Niall McLaughlin was shortlisted for the Stirling Prize in 2013, for his design of a stunning jewel-like chapel for a theological college near Oxford, he brought his client with him to the awards ceremony. This was the first (and perhaps the last) time that a group of Anglican nuns had graced such a spectacle.

Despite having God on his side, he lost out that year, but was eventually awarded the Stirling Prize in 2022, for the New Library at Magdalen College, Cambridge. Magdalen University was founded in 1428, and its alumni include Samuel Pepys, Norman Hartnell, and Bamber Gascoigne. Oxbridge colleges expect their buildings to last, and McLaughlin has presented a reassuring model that is robust and exquisitely detailed, mixing crisp layers of brick reminiscent of the American modernist Louis Kahn, with top notes of English Arts and Crafts, echoing the gabled forms of the college’s historic courts.

McLaughlin has now gone one better with this year’s Royal Gold Medal, one of the world’s most prestigious architectural honours. In recognition of a lifetime of work, the Gold Medal is awarded by the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) on behalf of the Monarch, to a person or group of people who have had a significant impact on the progress of architecture.

It acknowledges McLaughlin’s influence across architectural practice, critical discourse, and design education. The RIBA Prize jury describes him as “a pivotal figure in contemporary architecture”, whose work “not only enriches the architectural profession, but also addresses its evolving challenges”.

It’s an interesting choice, as McLaughlin isn’t particularly known for large projects. Instead, there is a sense of approaching things thoughtfully: designing, teaching, building and thinking. But perhaps these reflect less data-conscious times. Given the imperatives and challenges of the climate crisis, architecture has long since moved on from the brilliance and extravagance of the turn of the millennium. “Building is an action, not a thing,” says McLaughlin. “Architecture lies in its making and in the way it shapes learning, culture and community life.”

In practice for three decades, following his architectural training at University College Dublin, McLaughlin runs a modest-sized studio of 26 people, located unglamorously above the Aldi on London’s Camden High Street. Projects vary in type and ambition, from a sculptural bandstand on the seafront in Bexhill, spiraling like a giant bird (those nuns again), to an Alzheimer’s respite center in Dublin, which is organized around interconnected pavilions within an ancient walled garden. However, all his schemes are united by a sense of formal clarity, elementary geometry, and ascetic use of materials.

In a world in thrall to brand design, McLaughlin despises the idea of ​​an architect’s authorial signature. “The project can be incredibly original because of the way the bricks are joined,” he says. “Sometimes what’s quiet inside a project is the original.”

It has become something of a favorite among Oxbridge colleges. In addition to the Magdalene Library, he designed the Sultan Nazreen Shah Center for Worcester College, Oxford, as a laconic, low-volume building clad in precious stone, overlooking the Emerald Square on the college grounds. At the heart of the building is an apse-like hall for lectures and performances. Worcester has a good reputation for student theatrical performances, so McLaughlin wanted the hall to emulate the experience of standing under a tree, like a player roaming effortlessly through the landscape.

At the less austere end of the spectrum, he has also managed to give a veneer of decorum and dignity to social housing, which had long been seen as the Cinderella of architecture. He has designed several schemes for Peabody, a non-profit housing association, including apartment buildings in Silvertown, east London, enlivened by bright two-tone disco cladding, and at Darbyshire Place in Whitechapel, in one of Peabody’s oldest residential areas in London. Constructed of more sober, mottled gray brick, it takes its cues from the typical Peabody tenement blocks originally designed by Henry Darbyshire in the 1860s.

“Through practice, we have learned that architecture is not the production of individual objects, but a continuous performance of development, change and reinvention through lived experience,” says McLaughlin. “At a time of accelerating technological change in design and construction, we continue to insist on human rituals and material practices at the heart of our system.”

Teaching is also a core part of McLoughlin’s work, with stints at Oxford Brookes and the Bartlett School of Architecture at University College London, where he is currently Professor of Architectural Practice. He also taught in the United States as a visiting professor at Yale University and California.

Chris Williamson, President of RIBA and chair of the judging panel, said: “Niall always deserves to be recognized and uplifted by those around him, and it is fitting that Niall be recognized for the resounding impact he has had on the profession. As a mentor, he has been a wonderful role model for young architects, while his designs – eclectic in appearance and use – share a sense of care and grace that represents the best of architecture.”