The Stirling Prize, again

The Observer ran a piece by Rowan Moore, their Architecture editor, on the winner of the Stirling Prize, The Sainsbury Laboratory in Cambridge by Stanton Williams. Although I suggested that the short list was full of not very interesting buildings, Rowan Moore, through talking to Alan Stanton and Paul Williams, makes a case for a more condiered view. I particularly liked their comment about architecture and the senses:

(c) Brian Rosen

 "Touch and sense are fundamental. They are the ways in which architecture engages with people." Stanton and Williams's projects have got bigger since the 1980s, but they say they're still pursuing the same qualities. Their design of the Sainsbury Laboratory in Cambridge – which last week won this year's Stirling prize – is, among other things, about the effects of the stone, timber and concrete of which it is made, and the way in which it responds to the "path of the sun" and the "colour of the light".

Moore makes a good case for the winner, and I stand corrected.