Dezeen Magazine

RIBA President's Medal student winners 2018

RIBA reveals "talents to watch" in student winners of President's Medals 2018

The RIBA has announced the student winners of this year's President's Medals, with projects including a Bladerunner-esque hotel and a community of Icelandic pipe-hackers.

The Royal Institute of British Architects' President's Medals, which began in 1836, are the longest-running prizes awarded by the organisation.

This year they were awarded to seven students, studying at the Bartlett School of Architecture, the University of Bath, the Edinburgh School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, the University of Greenwich and De Montfort University.

RIBA President's Medal student winners 2018: Sonia Magdziarz won the silver medal with her project How to Carve a Giant
Sonia Magdziarz won the silver medal with her project How to Carve a Giant

The Silver Medal, the most prestigious of the prizes, went to Part-2 student Sonia Magdziarz for her project titled How to Carve a Giant.

Drawing on the links between communities and their cultural heritages, Magdziarz proposed a scheme for a library, workshop and archive carved into a form that tells a traditional Finnish Folktale. The project examined the preservation and dissemination of memory, and the role architects can play in this.

Magdziarz studied at the Bartlett School of Architecture and was tutored by Penelope Haralambidou, Michael Tite and Keiichi Matsuda.

RIBA President's Medal student winners 2018: Justin Bean won the Bronze Medal with his project Dreaming of Electric Sheep
Justin Bean won the Bronze Medal with his project Dreaming of Electric Sheep

The Bronze Medal, for the best design project produced by a Part-1 student or equivalent, went to Justin Bean's project Dreaming of Electric Sheep.

Bean, who studied at the University of Bath with tutors Martin Gledhill and Frank Lyons, designed a hotel inside an electrical substation.

The Bladerunner-inspired project imagined a more hopeful future than is typical in science fiction, where humans and technology co-combine harmoniously.

RIBA President's Medal student winners 2018: the Dissertation Medal went to Rosemary Milne for her thesis Species of Nooks and Other Niches
The Dissertation Medal went to Rosemary Milne for her thesis Species of Nooks and Other Niches

The Dissertation Medal went to Rosemary Milne, from the Edinburgh School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, for her thesis Species of Nooks and Other Niches.

Milne's taxonomy of nooks examined these overlooked spaces as an endangered species, at risk of being phased out by the current vogue for open-plan spaces. She makes the case for the relevance of the nook in contemporary architecture.

The judges were unanimous in the decision, calling Milne an "important new talent".

RIBA President's Medal student winners 2018: Camille Dunlop of the Bartlett School of Architecture was recognised for her project Pipeline Hijacking
Camille Dunlop was recognised for her project Pipeline Hijacking

Two students were recognised in the Serjeant Awards for Excellence in Drawing.

The Part-1 winner was Camille Dunlop of the Bartlett School of Architecture, for her project Pipeline Hijacking.

Dunlop's speculative project, detailed in dreamy cool ice tones, imagined a community built around hacking hot water pipes in the frozen wastes of Iceland.

The Part-2 winner was Maria Marilia Lezou of the University of Greenwich, for the Hotel Mollino: Staging Spaces of the Everyday as Heterotopias of Performance in Scenography and Architecture.

The project focused on the work of Italian architect Carlo Mollino imagined in model and digital forms in different locations.

RIBA President's Medal student winners 2018: Maria Marilia Lezou was awarded for the project Hotel Mollino: Staging Spaces of the Everyday as Heterotopias of Performance in Scenography and Architecture
Maria Marilia Lezou was awarded for the project Hotel Mollino: Staging Spaces of the Everyday as Heterotopias of Performance in Scenography and Architecture

There were also two winners of the SOM Foundation Fellowships: Part-1 student Grey Grierson, from the Bartlett School of Architecture, and Part-2 student Margaret Ndungu from De Montfort University.

RIBA president Ben Derbyshire describved all this year's winners as "talents to watch".

"The breadth and scale of talent evidenced in the design proposals and writings produced by this year's winners is truly remarkable," he said.

"This is an emerging generation of skilled thinkers who are able to distil complex ideas and resolve them into sophisticated architectural proposals."

This year's judging panel included OMA director Carol Patterson, new director of the AA Eva Franch i Gilabert, BIG's head of operations in London Henriette Helstrup, and the architect and novelist Lesley Lokko.

The seven winning projects will displayed at the RIBA in London from 8 December 2018 until 15 February 2019, before touring the UK and internationally.