RIBA Stephen Lawrence Prize 2025 Shortlist Announced

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11 August 2025 | Updated 13 August 2025

Six buildings have been shortlisted for the Stephen Lawrence Prize 2025, recognising architecture projects led by young talent. 

 

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The RIBA Stephen Lawrence Prize is awarded to projects led by an early career project architect, typically someone who has qualified within five years prior to the project’s completion date. The award was established in memory of Stephen Lawrence, a teenager who was murdered in a racially motivated attack in 1993. Stephen had ambitions to use his talent for maths, art, and design to become an architect, and he wanted to have a positive impact on his community.

The Stephen Lawrence Prize winner will be announced at the RIBA Stirling Prize ceremony on Thursday 16 October 2025, at The Roundhouse in London.

Let’s take a look at 2025’s shortlist:

 

Knepp Wilding Kitchen and Shop by Kaner Olette Architects

Project Architect: Toko Andrews

 

2025 RIBA South East Award Winner Knepp Wilding Kitchen and Shop by Kaner Olette Architects is an example of thoughtful architecture, rooted in sustainable practices and adaptive reuse. Set on a 3,500-acre rewilding project, Kaner Olette has transformed decaying and underused farmyard buildings into an aesthetically pleasing new venue.

The 18th-century timber-framed Sussex barn has been repaired with limited architectural interventions, a reinstated entrance bay, polished concrete floor, salvaged glazed screens and woven oak partitions.  

A previously “unexceptional” cow shed has been converted into a farm shop, a deliberate sustainable choice after analysing the embodied carbon of a potential replacement building of steel or glue-laminated timber. 

 

Hallelujah Project by Peregrine Bryant Architects

Project Architect: Helena Tunbridge

 

Hallelujah Project involves the conservation of a Grade I listed former home of George Frideric Handel and later Jimi Hendrix. It is now a museum offering exhibition spaces that celebrate the lives of the two musicians.

The original form of the house has been reinstated, restoring the original street frontage, replacing a later shopfront with a domestic brick frontage and reopening the basement area.

Where replacement elements were required, the team sourced reclaimed flagstones and timbers from similarly aged buildings. Plant equipment for the mechanical, electrical and plumbing systems has been painstakingly routed through the existing fabric, cleverly concealed underneath floorboards and in nooks. 

 

Pine Heath by Studio Hagen Hall 

Project Architect: Louis Hagen Hall

 

The Pine Heath project is a renovation of a late-modern terraced house in North London. The current owners prioritised rigorous sustainability from the outset to create a family home.

Elements of the thermal envelope were discreetly replaced or enhanced, including the installation of vacuum glazing in bespoke windows to minimise heat loss, and improvements to uninsulated walls, floors, and the roof. The previous gas boiler was replaced by roof-mounted photovoltaic panels connected to an air-source heat pump on the uppermost terrace. 

These interventions resulted in a 77 per cent reduction in heating demand, a 93 per cent reduction in annual carbon emissions, and a 75 per cent reduction in energy costs.

 

St. Mary’s Walthamstow by Matthew Lloyd Architects 

Project Architect: Alex Spicer

 

This ageing Grade II* listed church has been transformed into a bright, uplifting space that serves the wider community.

As the oldest surviving building in Walthamstow, St Mary’s required significant fabric repairs and upgrades to extend its life and allow the church to function as a hub for the whole community, as well as a place of worship.

The main roof of the existing building has been replaced with Welsh slate and insulated to improve energy performance. New secondary glazed doors have been added inside the east entrance, allowing a visual connection to the space within and creating a draught lobby. 

A new café servery can be concealed behind folding panels, and a new opening in the wall of the south aisle to the south vestry has effectively given the church a new space – awkward access meant that this was previously underused.  

The RIBA jury said that the interventions had been “carried out almost invisibly”.

 

University of Staffordshire Woodlands Nursery by Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios 

Project Architect: Jack Baker

 

Woodlands Nursery is a timber-clad, carbon-neutral nursery built on a former car park on the University of Staffordshire’s campus in Stoke-on-Trent. It provides 100 places for children up to five years old. The building features a timber-clad volume with distinctive roof lights and an L-shaped plan, with classrooms, play areas, a covered porch and an outdoor courtyard.

The covered porch functions as an outdoor room and transitional space for play, learning, and facilitating drop-off and pick-up, while also protecting the interior from direct sun.

Fresh air is drawn and cooled through underground earth pipes before entering the classrooms, while warm air exits through high-level opening roof lights. The building itself is made of a highly insulated lightweight timber frame clad with UK-sourced larch, which has a natural preservative and therefore is left unfinished to weather.

Rooftop photovoltaic panels provide 100 per cent of the electricity needed, with excess used on the university campus.

 

Picture: a photograph of Woodlands Nursery, showing the semi-covered play area. Image Credit: Daniel Hopkinson

 

The Jackson Library, Exeter College, Oxford by Nex

Project Architect: Joe Dent

 

This transformation of a deteriorating library in Exeter College has created a fresh environment for studying.

The refurbishment project revitalised the Grade II listed Jackson Library at Exeter College, Oxford, which had deteriorated and had inadequate facilities regarding comfort and accessibility. 

Nex has radically transformed the library through sensitive adaptations to the structure and a range of natural materials, tying together old and new. Externally, the repairs and conservation of the existing building are “discreet and robust.” 

The interior also features a new lift core and curving timber stairs topped by an oculus, with a warm material palette of timber, stone, and steel.

Picture: a photograph of the exterior of St Mary's Church in Walthamstow, showing the original church structure, with a modern structure at the front. Image Credit: Tim Crocker

Article written by Ella Tansley | Published 11 August 2025

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