O’Donnell + Tuomey builds on success brick by brick

Dublin-based architecture practice O'Donnell + Tuomey is widely expected to make the shortlist for the prestigious Stirling Prize to be announced today.

The firm's Saw Swee Hock Student Centre for the London School of Economics (LSE), a veritable brick riot just off Lincoln's Inn Fields, has already won several awards, including London Building of the Year.

In winning this accolade, conferred by the Royal Institute of British Architects (Riba), O’Donnell + Tuomey’s student centre beat Renzo Piano’s Shard skyscraper and Zaha Ha- did’s London Aquatics Centre.

But Riba’s Stirling Prize, named in honour of British architect Sir James Stirling, is the most coveted as it is awarded for the building that makes “the greatest contribution to the evolution of architecture”.

Previously shortlisted

O’Donnell + Tuomey has previously been shortlisted for the Ranelagh Multi-Denominational School (1999); the Glucksman gallery in Cork (2005); An Gaeláras in Derry (2011); and Belfast’s Lyric Theatre (2012).

On those occasions, the Stirling Prize was awarded to Future Systems for Lord’s Cricket Ground; the Scottish parliament by EMBT/RMJM; the Evelyn Grace Academy by Zaha Hadid; and the Sainsbury Laboratory in Cambridge by Stanton Williams.

What has strengthened O’Donnell + Tuomey’s hand this time is that the LSE student centre recently won a Riba prize in the education and community category, as well as the overall London Building of the Year award.

The highly angular building, which is very popular with LSE students, also won best international building in the Royal Institute of the Architects of Ireland’s annual awards, beating projects abroad by other Irish architects.

In competing for the Stirling Prize, worth £20,000 (€25,300), O’Donnell + Tuomey is up against such major projects as Caruso St John’s Tate Britain and David Chipperfield’s One Pancras Square, as well as Piano’s Shard and Hadid’s aquatics centre.

Controversial choice

The Shard, which is the tallest building in western

Europe

, would be the most controversial choice, given that it has split public opinion. Some are dazzled by its jagged form while others regard it as a random eruption on London’s skyline.

Hadid is also seen as an unlikely victor because she has already won the Stirling Prize twice (the first time for her Maxxi art museum in Rome), and her aquatics centre was completed two years ago and has only been “tweaked” since.

The 56 buildings on the longlist, announced last month, also include the Library of Birmingham by Mecanoo; the redevelopment of King’s Cross in London by John McAslan; and the Mary Rose Museum in Portsmouth by Wilkinson Eyre.