Níall McLaughlin
Architects

TWO RIBA NATIONAL AWARD WINS

JULY 2024

The WongAvery Music Gallery for Trinity Hall in Cambridge and Auckland Castle, Tower & Faith Museum have both won RIBA National Awards.

The Auckland Project was founded by philanthropist Jonathan Ruffer. The project is one of a series of urban and historic interventions that seek to preserve the Castle’s heritage, promote Bishop Auckland as a visitor destination and reinvigorate the town. The Castle project by Purcell Architects involved the conservation of the state apartments and domestic rooms, and the provision of new learning, catering, retail and visitor facilities. It sought to increase visitor engagement and bring to life the forgotten story of the Prince Bishops and their role in the nation’s past. In its pivotal location, the form and construction of the Auckland Tower is intended to echo lightweight provisional structures that would once have clustered around Castle walls. It allows people a view into the Castle to understand this previously secluded world. The new Faith Museum extension to the Castle takes the simple form of a barn with certain details developed to project a public representation of a sacred function and provides space for exhibition displays on faith in Britain. The Auckland project has previously been awarded an RIBA North East Building of the Year and North East Conservation Award.

The WongAvery Gallery is a music practice and performance space for Trinity Hall, Cambridge. The new building sits in the centre of Avery Court. The aim of this project was not only to provide a much-needed dedicated space for music practice and performance, but also to rejuvenate Avery Court by relandscaping the court around the new building in a collaboration with Kim Wilkie. It also houses environmentally sensitive musical instruments and the college’s music library. the Jury commented on the project “The jury left the pavilion having absorbed a sense of calm unusual in any building. This is an admirable project in the way it has set out exceptional architectural ambitions and succeeded in seeing them through both design and construction with outstanding rigour and attention to detail.”

AN OXFORD OUTING

DECEMBER 2017

Last month NMLA’s Balliol College team went on a celebratory excursion to Oxford to mark an important project milestone. We visited selected buildings by the office and by others, called at the site to observe demolition-in-progress, and finally hid from the rain for festive beverages.

All aboard the 9 o’clock train from London Marylebone. The sky is grey and the clouds are heavy.

One hour later, two taxis crawl up the hill to Ripon College. Ten excited people are deposited on its driveway.

We enter the chapel. Two people to pull the entrance door wide. Eyes up; iPhones out; pause to pose for photo.

Outside, driver’s thumbs drum-drumming against the steering wheel. Doors open; it’s time to go. Heart FM for the drive into town.

Students mill around Somerville College. Camouflaged amongst them we enter NMLA’s housing block. Up the stair tower, peeking into bedrooms and kitchens, we debate the merits of bathroom pods.

Herzog and de Meuron’s Blavatnik School of Government stands next to Somerville, glittering. Like magpies we are drawn through its doors.

On the roof terrace Oxford is laid out beneath us, dreaming spires etc., but next: lunch.

Heavier and happier, we walk to Worcester College’s Nazrin Shah Building. Heads pressed to the glass we stare greedily inside.

Later, eleven sets of PPE are donned and rainclouds assemble as we tour the site. Mud, glorious mud. Three years till ribbon-cutting.

The rain starts, the pub beckons. Cheers to Balliol!