Mae Architects has picked up the 2023 Stirling Prize for a daycare centre constructed in CLT in Blackheath, south London.
The London practice’s red-brick clad John Modern Centre is “an inspiring example of architecture enabling elderly living without isolation,” said RIBA. It has been designed “to encourage connection and movement among residents, supporting healthier and longer lives.
The addition to a 300-year-old residential and nursing facility has given it “a new lease of life,” said the judges, including treatment rooms, a hair salon, nail bar, events space and wellbeing facilities. They praised its “use of social spaces, and commitment to design for health and care.”
Chair of the jury, Ellen van Loon, commented: “The John Morden Centre is a place of joy and inspiration. It sensitively and seamlessly integrates medical facilities and social spaces.”
The other five shortlisted schemes (with only one being outside London) were A House for Artists in Barking, by Apparata Architects, Central Somers Town Community Facilities and Housing by Adam Khan Architects, Courtauld Connects at the Courtauld Institute of Art, by Witherford Watson Mann, Lavender Hill Courtyard Housing by Sergison Bates architects, and University of Warwick Faculty of Arts by Feilden Clegg Bradley.
Pic: Jim Stephenson