This years wooden spoon goes to a luxury block of flats in London’s Docklands. Lincoln Plaza, a residential development in London’s Docklands is the winner of the 2016 Carbuncle Cup. Designed by BUJ Architects for Galliard Homes, the development consists of two residential towers integrated with a hotel and a standalone drum shaped building set off to one side. — BD Online
The luxury block of flats in London designed by BUJ Architects has beaten five other projects in the running, Saffron Square by Rolfe Judd, The Diamond by Twelve Architects, One Smithfield by RHWL, Poole Methodist Church by Intelligent Design Centre and 5 Broadgate by Make Architects. The judges described the scheme as "a hideous melange of materials, forms and colours... Lincoln Plaza is the type of project that gives high-rise housing a bad name". Four of the nominees featured facades composed of offset geometrical patterns, utterly confusing to the eye at odds with the openings on their facades. It seems that the once fashionable patchwork quilt approach to facade design has worn thin.
However, there is a certain amount of discomfort surrounding the Carbuncle Cup. With the position of architects and their authority in the construction industry being ever challenged, is it productive to have an award of shame singling out architects? (and not dodgy contractors or clients?). Or is the Carbuncle Cup an essential counterpart to the numerous self-congratulatory awards that exist in the profession?
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"However, there is a certain amount of discomfort surrounding the Carbuncle Cup. With the position of architects and their authority in the construction industry being ever challenged, is it productive to have an award of shame singling out architects?"
I'd venture this discomfort comes primarily from the profession as this award points to the fact that our profession is disconnected with the public. If architects were really worried about their authority being challenged, maybe they ought to be thinking about what people on the street might actually like and what are the builder's needs rather than forcing down absurd aesthetics which have no payback for all the structural gymnastics being performed.
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