Urban Realm TOP100 Architects 2015

19 Jan 2015

Urban Realm’s New Year honours list doesn’t just capture the state of the nation in purely physical terms, it also brings to the fore the creativity and design nous exemplified by a profession well versed in difficult circumstances. Here we document some key recent projects and name Scotland’s best practices.

2014 has been a momentous year on playing fields and debating halls across the land but it is in our construction sites that the most enduring changes have been effected. Over the next 11 pages we’ve compiled the best practices and asked them to show us what they’re made of  whilst architects reveal what the year has meant for them in both business and design terms.

The New Year roll call kicks off in the unlikely environment of Glasgow’s east end, where jmarchitects’ cavernous concrete set piece, The Albus, extends the regeneration process instigated by the Commonwealth Games to Bridgeton. From there we head south to Kirroughtree Visitor Centre in Galloway Forest Park. Both projects couldn’t be further apart in terms of design but they share a common attention to detail and context, qualities which sent JM surging to the top in 2014.

Hot on their tail come Page/Park, Reiach & Hall and BDP, three steady pairs of hands who have impressed with the flamboyant Theatre Royal, Glasgow; Maggie’s Lanarkshire and ITREZ, Glasgow.

It is easy to overlook the magnitude of the changes being wrought when viewed from the perspective of a daily dripfeed, only when collated together does the true magnitude become apparent, including more than a few surprises.