"Hopeful and imaginative" social housing wins RIBA Stirling Prize 2025
The Appleby Blue Almshouse social housing complex in London, designed by local studio Witherford Watson Mann Architects, has won this year's RIBA Stirling Prize for the UK's best new building.
Created by Witherford Watson Mann on the site of an abandoned care home in Southwark, Appleby Blue Almshouse comprises 57 apartments for over-65s, organised around a central courtyard.
The project was awarded the prestigious prize by The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) in a ceremony this evening, where it also scooped the Neave Brown Award for the UK's best new affordable housing scheme.
It was hailed by the jury for setting an "ambitious standard for social housing among older people".
"This project is a clarion call for a new form of housing at a pivotal moment," said this year's jury chair Ingrid Schroder, who is director of London's Architectural Association (AA).
"Built against the backdrop of two crises, an acute housing shortage and a growing loneliness epidemic among older people, Appleby Blue offers a hopeful and imaginative response, where residents and the surrounding community are brought together through the transformative nature of the design," Schroder continued.
"By creating a radical and significant model that embraces co-living at a time where our demographics are shifting, Appleby Blue sets an ambitious standard for social housing among older people."
Run by United St Saviours Charity, Appleby Blue Almshouse draws on the almhouse typology – a historic form of low-cost sheltered housing for the elderly, often arranged around a courtyard.
However, unlike traditional secluded and inward-facing almshouses, it is deliberately designed to feel integrated within the surrounding area, featuring expansive street-facing bay windows.
Among the five-story block's stand-out features are co-living facilities, including a community kitchen and double-height garden room, a rooftop garden and earthy terracotta-tiled hallways.
The heart of the development is its central courtyard garden, which was designed with landscape architecture studio Grant Associates to emulate a woodland, complete with a cascading water feature, trees and flower beds.
The RIBA Stirling Prize has been awarded annually to the UK's best new building since 1996. Appleby Blue Almshouse was chosen from a six-strong shortlist, revealed in September.
It is the second time a Witherford Watson Mann-designed project has won the Stirling Prize, with the first being Astley Castle in 2013. The studio was also shortlisted in 2019 for Nevill Holt Opera.
The project was announced as this year's winner in a ceremony at London's Roundhouse this evening, where RIBA also revealed the winners of its four Special Awards.
This included the Neave Brown Award for Housing – an annual prize given in honour of modernist architect Neave Brown – which was also won by Appleby Blue Almshouse.
Meanwhile, the RIBA Client of the Year Award 2025 was given to United St Saviours Charity.
The other two prizes were the RIBA Reinvention Award, which recognises projects that reuse existing buildings, and the RIBA Stephen Lawrence Prize, which celebrates projects led by an early-career project architect.
These were won by Sheerness Dockyard Church by Hugh Broughton Architects and St Mary's Walthamstow by Alex Spicer at Matthew Lloyd Architects, respectively.
The winner of the 2024 RIBA Stirling Prize was the Elizabeth Line by architecture studios Grimshaw, Maynard, Equation and AtkinsRéalis. Grimshaw partner Neill McClements told Dezeen that the prize was "an endorsement of the importance of infrastructure".
This year's edition of the Stirling Prize has raised concerns about London bias, with four of the six shortlisted buildings located in the capital city. Earlier this week, we crunched the numbers to see whether the award for Britain's best new building really is London-centric.
The photography is by Philip Vile.
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