Run by the RIBA Competitions Office for Community Gateway Association, the competition attracted 74 entries, and the shortlist of four was announced in November last year.

Our winning scheme, comprising 14 new houses on a tight urban site to the north-east of Preston’s city centre, contains a mix of different unit sizes, with an innovative parking solution allowing an unbroken elevation to the southern boundary, and mews houses along a homezone to the north.

Dave Warlow, Community Gateway Association, said:

Throughout the Gateway Goes for Guild competition we have been overwhelmed by the responses and the quality of the submissions sent to us [74 entries].

RCKa have, with their proposal shown a thorough understanding of what we were looking for in this project.

Judges’ comment on RCKa’s proposals

This was a good team presentation from a practice that has relevant experience of housing in the region and a good balance of skills and past track record of working with Registered Social Landlords. The two lead architects both fit the ethos of Community Gateway and the local community and gave a clear indication that they would listen to the local residents and be comfortable working with them. The presentation was very sincere and the team gave the impression that this would be a special project for them.

The panel especially liked the focus on using local consultants and constructors, and the opportunities that the latter would afford for young people in the area to gain apprenticeships and employment. The house plans were well designed and suitable for the BME community, and the team had obviously got a good grasp of the site which was reflected in a well presented analysis. The issue of parking was handled ingeniously by bringing the cars into the garden spaces.

Links:

• Architects’ Journal, 21 January 2010 (subscription required)
• RCKa project page
• Community Gateway Association
• RIBA Competitions Office

Our proposal provides a range of house types, including eight four-bed, four three-bed houses and two bungalows on a tight urban site close to a sensitive conservation area. The scheme provides a new shared-surface homezone at the rear of the development linking through to the St. Ignatius’ Church, whilst maintaining a strong street frontage along Meadow Street and St. Paul’s Road.

Interviews to determine the winning team will be held in Preston next month.

Links:

• Architects’ Journal
• RIBA Competitions Office Press Release
• Gateway Goes for Guild Competition Page

RIBA Competitions Office Press Release:

Gateway goes for Guild Social Housing, Preston – Shortlist announced
Community Gateway Association, Preston’s largest housing association has announced the names of the 4 shortlisted teams in the competition to design a social housing development in Preston city centre, anticipated to be built and occupied to coincide with and celebrate Preston Guild 2012.
Preston Guild is a famous and unique celebration with more than 800 years of tradition. The Guild dates back to the granting of Preston’s first Charter by King Henry in 1179. Linking the city’s glorious heritage and past with its ambitions for the future, the Guild is Preston’s most important and historic event and is held every 20 years. The next Guild is in 2012 with the theme of ‘Innovation and Creativity’.
Architects were invited to develop innovative design proposals for a social housing development in the centre of Preston, where people would aspire to live. The winning scheme, with an emphasis on design quality and energy efficiency, was to be a project demonstrating that affordable does not equate to ordinary, and act as an exemplar for future social housing developments in Preston and elsewhere.
74 first stage entries were received and included submissions from Japan, Hong Kong, Italy, Greece, Portugal, France, Serbia, and the Netherlands. The four shortlisted teams in alphabetical order are:

• Conran & Partners, London
• KOSI Architects, Chichester
• Original Field of Architecture, Oxford
• RCKarchitects, London

Each of the shortlist will attend a final interview on the 8th December and discuss with the assessment panel their proposals. Each of these teams will receive an honorarium of £3,000.

The exhibition runs until the 27th of October.

RCKa were quoted in this week’s Architects’ Journal, offering advice to UK teams considering entering this year’s competition.

The deadline for entries is 26 June 2009, and the winners will be announced on 18 January 2010.

RCKa were runners-up for the Paromlin site in Zagreb, Croatia, in Europan 8 and winners for Stoke-on-Trent in the UK in Europan 9.

RCKa’s scheme included a new multi-function platform projecting out to sea, forming a space for regular markets selling local produce, an outdoor cinema screen and artificial rockpools.

RCKa competition team: Tim Riley, Russell Curtis, Dieter Kleiner, Tom Platt.

The publication is available from CABE’s website.

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• Building Design

The jury applauded the clarity of the diagram for this scheme, which combines the central public route down to the canal and an iconographic element in the apartment building. The terraced housing type exploits the topography of the site well, and the jury welcomed this project’s overall confidence and ambition, noting that the primary moves of the design are sufficiently strong to shine through the complexities of developing the project into a realisable scheme.
The jury felt, along with the city, that the project proposes a vision to aspire to for the quality inner-city family living that the City Waterside development requires. The residential tower was seen as a good solution to attracting a younger population, and this kind of accommodation with panoramic views is a rarity in Stoke-on-Trent.