24th AAI Awards 2009

I think one of the photos in the IT gives a hint as to what’s next 😉
It takes 3 to tango

A vintage year.

Splendid collection of buildings

usual suspects. The AAI awards are such a closed shop

What else should have won an award, Wearnicehats?

@wearnicehats wrote:

usual suspects. The AAI awards are such a closed shop

Unless you are being provocative the mind boggles at your stupidity

go to

http://architecturalassociation.ie/index.php/awards

and look at the names on there for the past 10 years. You’ll see what I mean

It appears that you are suggesting that the awards should be based not on architectural merit, but rather on the infrequency of the practice’s appearance on previous awards lists. An intriguing idea…….

propose some other schemes/ practices that should appear on the list this year and did not.

were a very incestuous bunch darlings..

Foreign Assessors were disgusted by our architecture in general.

But Wang, one of the AAI’s foreign assessors for the 2009 awards, said all of the individual buildings, as excellent as they might be, “will only be regarded in the historical context as fiddling while countrysides burn” unless architects in Ireland and elsewhere recognise their responsibilities to curb urban sprawl.

Another foreign assessor, London-based architect Dominic Papa, noted “an absence of collective, residential-led urban projects … at a scale or level of intention that represent larger strategies of urban or suburban renewal”. Instead, there was “a preponderance of house extensions and houses beautifully isolated”.

Hassett also found it “disheartening to see, yet again … the sheer effort expended by our best architects on the private realm. For sure, this is where people live and it is worthy of care. But it is when the effort transcends beyond care into fashion and the consumption of architecture as status that we must question our relevance.”

Connemara mapper Tim Robinson found it difficult to picture the entries in context, something he regarded as important to judge their architectural quality: “Too many of the photographs and Photoshop images helped themselves over-generously to that moment when twilight and lamplight collude in glamorising whatever they touch.”

Robinson was also “struck by a frightening degree of uniformity in many of these projects … There seem to be very few forms, used again and again – blocks with stuck-on balconies or jutting-out bits and pieces, big timber or metal cubes balanced on small glass pedestals, big oblong windows with no detailing around them.”

@wearnicehats wrote:

go to

http://architecturalassociation.ie/index.php/awards

and look at the names on there for the past 10 years. You’ll see what I mean

This theory seems to come up every time the AAI awards are announced. I’m curious to know what amazing projects or architects are out there that people think are being overlooked? A team of guest assessors judges the awards, not anybody from within the AAI. Is it possible that the same practices keep winning things because they might just have the most consistently high design standards?

@keating wrote:

were a very incestuous bunch darlings..

Foreign Assessors were disgusted by our architecture in general.

But Wang, one of the AAI’s foreign assessors for the 2009 awards, said all of the individual buildings, as excellent as they might be, “will only be regarded in the historical context as fiddling while countrysides burn” unless architects in Ireland and elsewhere recognise their responsibilities to curb urban sprawl.

Another foreign assessor, London-based architect Dominic Papa, noted “an absence of collective, residential-led urban projects … at a scale or level of intention that represent larger strategies of urban or suburban renewal”. Instead, there was “a preponderance of house extensions and houses beautifully isolated”.

Hassett also found it “disheartening to see, yet again … the sheer effort expended by our best architects on the private realm. For sure, this is where people live and it is worthy of care. But it is when the effort transcends beyond care into fashion and the consumption of architecture as status that we must question our relevance.”

Connemara mapper Tim Robinson found it difficult to picture the entries in context, something he regarded as important to judge their architectural quality: “Too many of the photographs and Photoshop images helped themselves over-generously to that moment when twilight and lamplight collude in glamorising whatever they touch.”

Robinson was also “struck by a frightening degree of uniformity in many of these projects … There seem to be very few forms, used again and again – blocks with stuck-on balconies or jutting-out bits and pieces, big timber or metal cubes balanced on small glass pedestals, big oblong windows with no detailing around them.”

Honestly is it not the same in countless other countries?

Are we a disgrace to ourselves? Not really. Look at the bell curve. Look at the amount of work that fits into the higher bracket. Only a tiny amount fits into the upper curve. The vast majority is mediocre, as it is in the vast amount of countries. Please don’t be as pessimistic in a year in which three most splendid buildings won a medal and two awards. This is the peak of Irish architecture for the years to come.

PTB: you’re dead right; there’s no need for Ireland to beat itself up – there are some very good buildings out there. The main points of criticism to be taken to heart are:
(a) the terrible sameness about many houses and house extensions- a kind of received orthodoxy about cuboids; and
(b) the lack of an urbanism in the design for housing schemes – the recession may give an opportunity for a more programmed and urban approach to the expansion of towns, assuming both planners and architects are up to it. Are they? (JHR and the politics of the inalienable right to a stand-alone house allowing, of course.)

@what? wrote:

It appears that you are suggesting that the awards should be based not on architectural merit, but rather on the infrequency of the practice’s appearance on previous awards lists. An intriguing idea…….

propose some other schemes/ practices that should appear on the list this year and did not.

no – I am suggesting that the awards are earmarked before they happen ie “ok what award are we giving soandso this year? which firm is winning the award for the “slightly quirky box like small extension to a house in D6 or thereabouts?”

suggesting alternatives is only inviting the wrath of those who have already jumped down my throat.

at no point have I suggested that the schemes therein do not have any or some architectural merit. I am simply tired of the conclusion by implication that the same old faces are the only people worthy of merit. Have a look at the schemes by certain people that were deemed worthy 10 years ago compared to those of the same people now – have they really advanced architecturally?

It would be fun if they secretly decided to pick one at random each year just to check whether those winners would go on to establish a firm a grasp on the annual awards as all the other winners.