2025 has been a year of looking closely – at buildings that endure, at ideas that travel, and at practices quietly reshaping the values of architecture. From the long view offered by the Architecture Today Awards to encounters with unexpected projects, places and people around the world, AT editor Isabel Allen looks back on a year rich in surprise, conviction and renewed optimism about what architecture can still achieve.
Material Cultures
Material Cultures explain how they are challenging conventional construction cultures in a bid to bring architecture closer to agriculture, land management and landscape.
Building financial resilience
Seasoned CFO and CEO George Panos outlines how better forecasting, realistic pricing and consistent billing can create more resilient practices.
Caochan na Creige wins RIBA House of the Year
Named RIBA House of the Year 2025, Izat Arundell’s self-built home in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides was recognised for its sensitivity to place, hyper-local materiality and assured response to an extreme landscape.
Looking back at Battersea Power Station
WilkinsonEyre director Sébastien Ricard reflects on the long and complex journey to restore Battersea Power Station, exploring how flexibility, mixed use and deep respect for heritage were essential to transforming a near-derelict industrial monument into a resilient piece of city.
My Kind of Town: Manijeh Verghese
Open City CEO Manijeh Verghese marvels at Mumbai's rapid transformation and asks how you can slow the pace of change to a rate that allows its people to shape its future.
68 Erith Hub
alma-nac’s transformation of a long-vacant high-street unit in Erith creates a flexible, low-carbon community hub, organised around a generous threshold space that links between street and interior.
Reflections: Chapel of Reconciliation
John Pardey revisits de Blacam & Meagher’s Chapel of Reconciliation at Knock – a landmark of 20th century Irish Architecture – tracing its pilgrimage roots, profound materiality, and overarching influence on a new generation of Irish architects.
Christmas Festival of Bad Habits
Peer Collective and artist Kateřina Šedá reimagine the Christmas market as a public space for reflection, sobriety and shared experience in Brno, Czech Republic.
Freetown International Airport
Set against Sierra Leone’s tropical coastline, Freetown International Airport relies on Şişecam’s Duosol T 50 glazing to balance solar control, thermal performance, and visual clarity in one of West Africa’s most demanding climates.
Sea Gardens
Howells’ 40-acre Sea Gardens masterplan in Bray, County Wicklow, is set to deliver 1,200 new homes alongside shops, cafés and parks. With phase one now complete, project lead Daniel Mulligan reflects on what this former golf course will bring to Bray’s future – and how the team approached such a sensitive town extension.
5 minutes with…OGU Architects
AT catches up with Rachel O'Grady and Chris Upson to find out what's next for Belfast-based OGU Architects, and hear about their use of demountable structures to trial urban change, engaging communities in their city's future.
The Tractor Shed House
Bindloss Dawes Architects has transformed a modest agricultural structure on the edge of Nether Compton, Dorset, into a zero-carbon home, drawing on the pragmatism of rural construction to deliver a warm, precise and light interior.
Ask the expert: Navigating Whole Life Carbon Assessment for flat roofs
Louis Weir, Sustainability Manager at IKO, answers readers’ questions on how whole life carbon assessment is shaping the design and specification of flat roofing systems.
Third Space, Udaipur
Photographer Timothy Soar shares his photographs – and his impressions – of Third Space in Udaipur by Studio SAAR, a vibrant cultural and educational hub born from a belief that communities deserve places of aspiration, not as a luxury, but as a birthright.
Materials library: tp bennett
Carmen Wochner explains how the practice’s carefully curated materials library blends product inspiration and tactility with a desire to educate and inform.
RIBA President’s Medals 2025
History, ecology and cultural memory converge in the RIBA President’s Medals 2025, which recognise outstanding student work from around the world.
Intelligent specification
How can the construction industry accelerate the transition to net zero? And where do the main challenges and opportunities lie in relation to intelligent design and specification? These questions were addressed by a panel of experts at a round table discussion in London hosted by AT in partnership with IKO.
Futurebuild 2026
Connecting ambition with action is the focus of Futurebuild 2026, which takes place at Excel London from 3rd-5th March.
in partnership with AccuRoof (formerly SIG Design and Technology)
Blaise Diagne International Airport
At Senegal’s Blaise Diagne International Airport, a combination of Şişecam’s high-performance Solar Low-E glazing and advanced laminated safety glass mitigate intense climatic conditions, while also ensuring high levels of transparency, comfort and security.
School of Specification – Materials Passports
Rachel Hoolahan, Associate Director at Orms, has produced a School of Specification module on Materials Passports. She considers the advantages and challenges of implementing materials passports as well as how project teams can start using them.
Zayed National Museum
Designed by Foster + Partners, the UAE’s national museum in Abu Dhabi explores the history, identity and legacy of the nation through striking architecture, immersive displays, and a high-performance environmental strategy.
Spotlight on products in use
in partnership with manufacturers
Istanbul Airport
High-performance glass from Şişecam delivers energy efficiency, acoustic comfort and safety, across one of the world’s largest transport hubs.
A new future for Udaipur
Ananya Singhal of Studio Saar explains his game plan to rescue his hometown of Udaipur, India, from the ravages of uncontrolled development and empower its residents to envisage – and insist on – a regenerative future.
Tiny House
Luxembourg’s first 3D-printed home tackles the country’s prominent housing crisis, producing an economical and environmentally responsible solution.
Reflections: Ronchamp Chapel
John Pardey on how Le Corbusier’s Ronchamp Chapel marked a revolutionary departure from his machine-age classicism — a sculptural, light-filled sanctuary where curved walls, hooded towers and a hovering roof reimagined the possibilities of modern sacred architecture.
Raymond Chandler Library
A new library is the first move in alma-nac’s reworking of the Junior and Lower School campus at London’s Dulwich College. Former pupil Ken Okonkwo explains how the project embeds net zero principles, reflects the school’s culture of curiosity and collaboration, and has doubled the number of borrowed library books.
Dispatches from Udaipur, India
Mike Tonkin and Anna Liu of Tonkin Liu chat to AT about the lessons to be learnt from rickshaws at rush hour, intergenerational households, and Krishnamurti's wise words.
