The awards, now in their twentieth year, celebrate those who have demonstrated the vision and commitment to restore Georgian buildings and create new work in the spirit of the Georgian era across the United Kingdom. The winners were announced on the 1st October, at Inner Temple Library, London, where the awards were presented by John Goodall, architectural editor for Country Life. 

Crispin Holborow, Country Director of Savills Private Office and member of the judging panel says, “Now in their twentieth year it is a huge privilege to return as sponsors of the Georgian Group Architectural Awards. The standard of entries and ultimate winners is a real testament to how highly valued the architectural principles of the Georgian era remain today. From restoration projects giving new leases of life to privately and publicly owned Georgian buildings to starting from scratch, the depth of commitment and passion for honouring the era were unifying themes throughout the judging, and we had great fun too.”

John Goodall, Architectural Editor for Country Life adds, “The variety and richness of our Georgian Heritage is astonishing. These awards are a means both of celebrating this inheritance but also highlighting the love, care and resources that are expended on them to our universal benefit.”

David Adshead, Director of the Georgian Group says “As ever, it was rewarding to see the great variety of projects put forward for this year’s Georgian Group Architectural Awards - marvellous, beautiful, often heroic, some surprising.  But all revealed vision, enthusiasm, skill and commitment - on the part of owners, architects, contractors and craftsmen.  We thank and salute them as we do those funding bodies who also believed in the possible. Despite economic uncertainties, continuing problems with supply chains and the escalating cost of materials, these projects show just how much Georgian buildings are admired and valued and how they can live on to serve new purposes.

The award winners by category

Restoration of a Georgian Country House

Winner: Brockfield Hall

Brockfield Hall, a brick and slate Regency house listed at Grade II*, was built between 1804 and 1807 by Benjamin Agar to the design of Peter Atkinson, junior partner of John Carr of York, and boasts a splendid oval staircase hall.  The present owners, Charlie Wood and Hatta Byng, took the house on in 2020.  It was bought by the family in 1951, and in its 220 year history has only been owned by two others.  Working with Rupert Cunningham of Ben Pentreath Architects, they undertook restoration, re-servicing and redecoration (by Hesp and Jones), over the course of 18 months.  The clarity of the 1804 plan was regained by unblocking doorways and removing less prudent 20th-century interventions, particularly in the back of house area where the ground floor spaces of a separate flat were brought back into the main house.  A  passageway now runs from a new boot room to the main hall, providing a connecting vista.  Mr Agar’s upstairs drawing room has been transformed into a handsome bedroom hung with a hand-painted chinoiserie wallpaper.  New bathrooms and a new kitchen have also been added.  Building components found on site have been repurposed and elsewhere reclaimed materials, such as pine floorboards and Delft tiles, brought in.  All new plasterwork and joinery has been designed and decorated in a traditional way so that a visitor would be hard pressed to distinguish the old from the new.  The judges were impressed by the way that the original vision for the house has been regained, while new work has been integrated seamlessly with the old.

Restoration of a Georgian Church

Winner: St Mary’s Warwick

Following their destruction in the great fire of Warwick in 1693, the nave, transepts and finally the tower of the collegiate Church of St Mary, Warwick were rebuilt between 1697 and 1704 to the design of Sir William Wilson, who by tradition may have had advice from Sir Christopher Wren.  The tower, a spirited essay in early 18th century neo-Gothic, has suffered serious problems in recent years, exacerbated by inappropriate work undertaken in the 1980s.  Following a series of stone falls in 2021, Warwick District Council served a dangerous structures notice on the church which put up an emergency scaffold until the necessary £1.8m could be raised. The failure of the Triassic Sandstone was investigated, deeply bedded vegetation was removed, construction defects corrected and stone replaced where necessary.  All cement mortar was also replaced in favour of Hot Lime.  Finally the GRP surrounds to the clock dial were replaced in stone, the heraldic shields and ‘manicules’ conserved and the weather vanes repaired and re-gilded.  The work was designed by the conservation architect Mark Stewart and the contractor was Ackroyd Construction.

Re-Use of a Georgian Building

Winner: The Camellia House

Sitting within the registered landscape at Wentworth Woodhouse, the early 19th century Camellia House is a building of two parts: on its northern side is a tea room built in 1738 for Lady Mary Finch, the wife of the 1st Marquess of Rockingham.  Listed Grade II*, and home to some of the rarest and oldest surviving Camellias in the Western world, it was derelict for more than 50 years and long on Historic England’s Buildings at Risk Register. The Wentworth Woodhouse Preservation Trust commissioned Donald Insall Associates to repair the building, ensuring that the Camellias would have a suitable environment and providing the estate with a new tearoom.  The work, enabled by a £4 million grant from the National Lottery Heritage Fund, integrates traditional conservation with contemporary services technology.  The glazed, opening  roof was reinstated, the very large windows to the south were remade in stainless steel with lead glazing bars, and underfloor heating, a ground source heat pump, and rainwater harvesting were introduced. The project brought economic and social benefits too.  The site provided an opportunity for Historic England’s summer school to involve 19 heritage craft trainees, while the majority of the contracting firms were from Yorkshire.  The completed project has created 22 new local jobs.

Restoration of a Georgian Building in an Urban Setting

Winner: Sherborne House

Sherborne House, Grade I, dates from c.1720 when the principal block was constructed for Henry Seymour Portman to a design attributed to Benjamin Bastard.  It was built onto an existing Tudor wing with an earlier Medieval core.  For more than 130 years the house was occupied by tenants and subsequently Lord Digby’s School for Girls.  Following its closure in 1992, the building was put on Historic England’s Heritage at Risk register. Successive schemes proposing use as an arts centre failed to attract funding, and conservation works that were to have been funded by enabling development never transpired.  In 2018 it was bought by the present owners, and a rescue scheme developed by Spase Architects & Surveyors, with a brief to balance restoration of the building with its use to advance public education in the arts. Exterior walls, historic panelling, and chimneypieces have been repaired, inappropriate paints removed and new decorative finishes introduced. Central has been the conservation of Sir James Thornhill’s c.1726 decorative scheme for the staircase.  Insulation has been sensitively introduced where possible to enhance the building’s thermal performance, and air source heat pumps, mechanical ventilation and heat recovery installed to reduce the scheme’s carbon footprint.

 Giles Worsley Award for New Building in Spirit of Georgian Era

Winner: Sparsholt Manor

This complex project involved: the comprehensive restoration and internal re-ordering of the late 17th and mid-18th century manor house, listed Grade II; and the construction of a new domestic wing on the site of a former stable range, which obscured views to the Romantic lake landscape to the east. From the south the new elements respond to the classical order and balance of the existing house, whilst from the north they speak to the informality of the older, gabled part of the house.  A newly-built octagonal tower overlooking the lakes balances the composition, and contains a cantilevered stone stair leading up to new guest rooms, and down to a swimming pool.  The ceiling of the pool hall is an exposed white concrete diagrid, which supports the garden terrace above and pulls the eye towards the wall of windows and garden beyond. Adam Richards Architects worked with the team from RW Armstrong, led by Andrew Hine, and landscape architects Bradley-Hole Schoenach.  The design provides a creative balance between the rigours of classical architecture and the abstraction of contemporary design.

The judges admired the thoughtful way in which every element relates to the next, both in terms of volume, function and use of materials, brick and stone.

New Building in a Georgian Context

Winner: Little Durnford Manor

Little Durnford Manor, a Grade I house on the River Avon, to the north of Salisbury, is of curious character.  Late 17th century in origin, it was  remodelled in c.1720-1740, for Edward Younge, and again in the late 18th century.  Its southern and western elevations offer distinctly different interpretations of Palladian architecture, though both are patterned in limestone block and flint chequerwork with ashlar surrounds to their windows. This use of materials characterises the stable block too and is reflected in the remnants of a service wing, demolished in the 19th century.  An original drawing of c.1750, together with careful fabric analysis, show that parts of this wall survives from the original wing. Yiangou Architects, with the contractor R. Moulding & Co., have successfully designed and built a new wing in the position of the earlier one, incorporating the surviving fabric.  It provides a series of bedrooms on the first floor, connected to the main house, and, on the ground floor, accommodation for a gardener’s mess, larder and storage for garden produce. This carefully researched and detailed reinstatement has also made the various parts of the complex more cohesive.

New Georgian Country House

Winner: Tiverton House

Tiverton House, in Aldeburgh, Suffolk has been designed by Quinlan Terry Architects in the English Palladian tradition.  It is a compact house built within a walled plot close to the centre of the town. Its intimate scale and materials - buff coloured ‘Suffolk’ bricks and white joinery - reflect its context and the client’s brief for a welcoming house for visiting children and grandchildren, in which all bedrooms are of the same size.  Within, the  rooms are high-ceilinged and on the south or garden side, where they are interconnected by large arched openings, the large sashes provide generous light. Despite its compact nature the main staircase provides great visual drama, and at first floor level its top-lit well is surrounded by arch headed gallery spaces providing views through the building to the sea.

The Diaphoros Prize

Winner: The Royal College of Music

 The Royal College of Music, one of the world’s leading conservatoires, commissioned John Simpson Architects Ltd., to resolve major circulation challenges that had been caused by piecemeal additions to its campus in the 1960s and ‘70s, and which had left it inefficient to use and difficult for both students and visitors to navigate.  Other objectives of the ‘More Music Project’ were to provide additional facilities and to upgrade existing ones to conform with evolving legislation. A new courtyard at entrance level, which serves as the social heart of the complex, and a triple height, top-lit foyer space are central to the new circulation pattern and allow access to lifts and stairs.  A café-bar, restaurant and new kitchen facilities have also been incorporated. Below, are now two multifunctional performance venues - acoustically insulated and with adjustable acoustics for different types of music. Not only have more performance, practice and teaching spaces been added and recording and streaming technology installed, but a new museum has been created to display the College’s very significant collection of historic musical instruments. The judges admired the way the three dimensional circulation problems have been solved and how the new works, both inside and outside spaces, in a Contemporary Classical idiom, complement and tie together the diverse range of buildings, which include the original ones designed by Arthur Blomfield and Sidney Smith between 1894 and 1901.