Elizabeth Line triumphs with RIBA Stirling Prize 2024

The winner of 2024’s RIBA Stirling Prize, sponsored by Autodesk, has been announced as the Elizabeth Line, by Grimshaw, Maynard, Equation and AtkinsRéalis. The public votes, run variously by the RIBA and the Architects’ Journal, showed that largescale infrastructure and masterplanning were the clear winners of the six shortlisted projects. And it is likely to be by far the most visited Stirling Prize winner; there were 300 million journeys in its first two years, now 700,000 passengers travel each weekday.

The Elizabeth Line is so good it is almost boring; the architecture has already been absorbed into the London experience. But it shouldn’t be taken for granted. The design makes for frictionless journeys; the enclosed underground spaces feel open and relaxed even when busy, as one tunnel curves seamlessly into the next. The clean clarity of its wall panels, clear grids running through them, the warmth of lighting and integrated systems elevate the travelling experience.

This was recognised by the judges with chair RIBA president Muyiwa Oki saying: ‘This is architecture of the digital age – a vast scheme that utilises cutting-edge technology to create distinctive spatial characteristics and experiences. It rewrites the rules of accessible public transport, and sets a bold new standard for civic infrastructure, opening up the network – and by extension, London – to everyone.’

There will, inevitably, be controversy over making the award to a project that was over budget and opened four years late. But the end result and its Stirling Prize send an optimistic message about the value of architecture, and the UK’s ability to deliver world class design on its own doorstep through a collaborative design approach and a clear design direction. This is particularly welcome as UK practices continue to play a pivotal role in projects across the world. You can read more about the process of designing for the Elizabeth Line from Grimshaw partner Neill McClements here.

After the announcement RIBA Journal had the first interview with Grimshaw partner Neill McClements.
RJ Congratulations on your Stirling win! Did you always know it was going to be a remarkable project?
Neill McClements: You could tell from the scale that it could be a remarkable project. It was not something I had ever dared dream of, infrastructure doesn’t normally get recognition in these type of awards.

Infrastructure projects have their own momentum, so first of all you are just hoping it will survive the politics and get built. Then you are working out how to design around the constraints of the programme. Once we started we knew we had to get in front quite early, we had just six to nine months to feed to the station teams.

RJ It started in 2009, did you expect it to take so many years of your life?
NM My son was three when it started. He turns 18 in a few weeks; it is a cross-generational project! When you look at the impact infrastructure can have, changing the city and all the many benefits of connectivity it is worth it.

RJ This award is for more than connectivity though...
NM The social value only comes if people use the system, if you can attract people in. It gets 14 million cars off the road.

We were really conscious of the scale of the stations, which are twice the size of underground stations. If the design was not good they would be oppressive. So we wanted to express the full volume of the engineering, uplight longer tunnels, make the acoustics work so it didn’t echo but felt civilised.

RJ How do you get around London? What is your favourite mode of transport?
NM Public transport! I work near Farringdon Station so I am on the Elizabeth Line and Thameslink a huge amount.

RJ Do you sometimes spot a detail and regret it?
NM Yes. But less so than on other projects. The mock ups and contractor prototyping mean you go ‘eek’ far less than on one off buildings.

RJ With the truncation of HS2 do you feel we have missed the chance for another brilliant infrastructure project in this generation?
NM We are a global practice with studios around the world. And there are clients around the world who really respect British architecture and especially our work with infrastructure. It is really important we hold that knowledge in the country. We need to have confidence to move forward with more projects.

RJ What are you working on now?
NM Ironically a new metro line in Dublin, connecting the northern suburbs to the centre. Its Dublin’s first underground line.

RJ What are you going to do now? Celebrate? Who do you have to call?
NM I have to call my wife and son to let them know! And then I will go and celebrate the team, after 13 years we have all lived and bonded together.

2024 is Grimshaw’s first Stirling Prize win, although it was a strong contender in 2001 with the giant ETFE biomes of the Eden Project. At the time Eden seemed hugely ambitious. But it is dwarfed in scope by the rail scheme crossing London to link Reading in Berkshire to Shenfield in Essex, dodging many other underground obstacles on the way. The development is unsurpassed for consistent, tested and honed design encompassing platform architecture, passenger tunnels, escalators, station concourses, signage, furniture, fittings, finishes and supporting technology across the 41 stations, including large parts of the 10 new stations, co-ordinating with each of their own, separate, architecture teams.

Analysis of the last 20 years’ of the RIBA’s data on Stirling Prize shortlists shows that Grimshaw is the only practice in this period to have made it onto the shortlist with a transport project: first with London Bridge Station and now with the Elizabeth Line. In 2008, when international projects were eligible for the Stirling Prize, the practice’s Bjljmer ArenA Station in Amsterdam was shortlisted.

Grimshaw has had a proud history of transport design in London since the International Terminal at Waterloo Station completed in 1993. It has now been co-opted for the expansion of the country’s domestic lines and also the first phase of reworking Paddington Station (1999) and the Northern Line stations on the spur to Battersea Power Station that pop up with their faceted canopies (2021). Beyond the capital, UK projects include Stoke-on-Trent’s city-centre bus station, and extensions to Reading Station and Newport Station. This work continues apace internationally in Melbourne, Las Vegas and Sweden. Grimshaw’s Neill McClements reflected that the Elizabeth Line is more than a design for travel: ‘It is also a recognition of the challenges that our profession faces today – the responsibility we have to rapidly respond to the climate emergency, decarbonise our cities and prioritise social and economic equity.’

Where are the Stirling shortlisters 2014-2024?

New analysis shows that the Stirling shortlisters over the last 20 years range from Falkirk to St Ives.

London has had almost as many shortlisters as the rest of the UK put together. As the capital is an international finance centre, this is not surprising. But it is not the entire story, as the spread of shortlisted projects in the less well-off boroughs demonstrates, this year including Al-Jawad Pike’s social housing in Hackney and last year the House for Artists in Barking by Apparata Architects.

After London, the East and Scotland have most Stirling shortlisters with six and five respectively. Education has played an important role supplying 10% of the shortlisted schemes during the period, compared to 2% for transport. Investment by Oxford and Cambridge Universities, and their colleges, have seen a total of three from each. Just one project could have pulled Cambridge ahead this year with Feilden Fowles’ Homerton Dining Hall being touted as a contender by Rowan Moore in the Observer, but it wasn’t to be. The University of Manchester had two shortlisted projects in the last 20 years with the Whitworth (MUMA) and Manchester School of Art (FCB Studios). Similarly, the City of Glasgow College has a pair of developments, designed by Michael Laird Architects & Reiach & Hall Architects.

The RIBA is in the process of developing an interactive map of award-winning projects from the past decade, providing an exciting new platform to showcase and search for exemplar architecture. The ambition is to launch this in summer 2025.

See the 2024 RIBA special awards including the Neave Brown Award for Housing and the Reinvention Prize.  More on the Stirling Prize from the RIBA

The RIBA Stirling Prize is sponsored by Autodesk