NIALL MCLAUGHLIN INTERVIEWED ON RADIO NEW ZEALAND
APRIL 2014
Whilst visiting New Zealand as guest lecturer for the 2014 Futuna Lecture Series, Niall McLaughlin was interviewed by Kim Hill for the Saturday Morning Show on Radio New Zealand. During the 40 minute conversation they discussed ideas behind a range of the practice’s projects including a private house on Ireland’s west coast, the athletes’ housing scheme for the London Olympics and an apartment block for the Peabody Trust in Silvertown.
The conversation also drew in wider architectural themes, touching on contemporary attitudes to construction and sustainability, Modernism’s tendency towards introversion, and the increasing disconnect between abstract ideas and built form.
Niall concluded the conversation saying, “I do think that buildings should be embodiments of ideas, and people working with architects should be confident to say, ‘These are my ideas. What kind of buildings can you make out of them.’ ”
To listen to the full interview click here.
RIBA PRESIDENT’S MEDALS STUDENT AWARDS
DECEMBER 2013
Two members of the practice have won the main awards at this years RIBA President’s Medals Student Awards. The two medals were chosen from over 300 submissions, the best student work from 65 schools around the world.
Ben Hayes received the President’s Medal for his project entitled Kizhi Island, which proposes the restoration and reassembly of 250 wooden Orthodox churches on the small island in northern Russia. The proposal is for a curated museum landscape that incorporates the re-located ecclesiastical structures and an associated restoration and research facility.
Tamsin Hanke received the Dissertation Medal for her thesis, Magnitogorsk: Utopian Vision of Spatial Socialism. The work explored how the political ideology of the city was expressed spatially in the city during the years 1930 to 1953 and how the urban form has manifested in a social-economic legacy that remains to this day.
Ben and Tamsin studied with Niall and his teaching partners Yeoryia Manoloupoulou and Michiko Sumi in Unit 17 at the Bartlett School of Architecture in University College London. Tamsin’s Dissertation Supervisor was Sophia Psarra.