The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) has announced the shortlist for the Manser Medal, sponsored by The Rooflight Company.

The award is given for the best one-off house or major extension designed by an architect in the UK.

A modernist seaside house in Essex and a transformed Victorian semi-detached are both competing for this year’s Manser Medal, along with two houses from Northern Ireland. One is an architects’ family home, unusually clad all over in a “fibre-cement suit of armour” and the other a reinvention of the Victorian villa for the twenty-first century.


The shortlist was drawn from the RIBA Award-winning buildings which were announced earlier this year in May. The Manser Medal winner will be announced and presented alongside five other special awards, at the RIBA Stirling Prize Dinner on Saturday 6 October at The Roundhouse, London.

The shortlist for the Manser Medal 2007 is:

• Dowling House, Cultra, County Down by Hackett + Hall
• Kander House, London by Jamie Fobert Architects
• New Dwelling, Randalstown, County Antrim by Alan Jones Architects
• The Salt House, St Lawrence Bay, Essex by Alison Brooks Architects

The medal is judged by a panel including Michael Manser CBE, former President of the RIBA; Simon Knox of Knox Bhavan Architects, winner of the 2006 Manser Medal and Tony Chapman, RIBA Head of Awards.

(CD/SP)