The Royal Shakespeare Company appointed Ian Ritchie Architects in October 2004 to lead the design of the temporary RSC Transition Theatre in Stratford. Within 2 months of our appointment a detailed planning application was submitted by the RSC on 13th December. The engineering consultants working with the RSC project team includes WSP, King Shaw Associates and Paul Gillieron Acoustic Design. The RSC will have the new 1000 seat Transition Theatre available for performances in April 2006 in time for the planned Complete Works of Shakespeare Festival. The Transition Theatre will be in use for a few years as the main house while the new Royal Shakespeare Theatre theatre is rebuilt.

Ian Ritchie, together with Peter Cook have been elected the Royal Academy’s Joint Professors of Architecture. They intend to promote the architectural strength of the Royal Academy internationally over a four year period with a series of lectures and workshops in cities less obviously associated with leading edge architecture.

Anthony Whishaw’s invitation to Academicians to respond to the theme of ‘Visual Wit’ has resulted in a surprising range of interpretations. Members including painters, sculptors, architects, and printmakers have submitted works, many made especially for this exhibition. The concept of wit is explored in a number of ways, with artists employing optical illusions, using found objects, referencing past artistic icons and playing with humour.

Ian Ritchie’s contribution, ‘Architecture is Addictive’, can be seen in the Friends Room of the Royal Academy from 24 November - 8 March 2005.

Ian Ritchie gave the keynote address entitled, ‘Design, Ethics and Innovation’ at the SOM Building Science and Design Research Symposium in New York on 19-20 November.
The symposium was designed to bring together a diverse group of architects, academics, owners and industry representatives to present and discuss design and technology ideas about new materials, intelligent building systems and sustainable development practices in architecture.

Ian Ritchie gave a talk at the Tate Britain on 25 November as part of ‘Clear Visions’, a series of seminars on the glazed envelope organised by Architecture Today with Pilkington. The subject of the seminars is the design and maintenance of the glazed envelope.

TR2 was awarded the Abercrombie Design Award for Best New Building and was also the Overall Winner Abercrombie Architectural Design Award at The Abercrombie Awards in November. The Awards were designed to celebrate design excellence and, in a period of exciting change in Plymouth with the Mackay Vision for Plymouth capturing the public’s imagination, it is hoped that they will play an important role in raising the standard of design in Plymouth and contribute to the regeneration of the city.

In the context of the Franco-British Initiative jointly promoted by the “direction de l’architecture et du patrimoine” (DAPA) of the French cultural ministry and the “Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment”(CABE), the French part of this affordable/social housing competition has been launched, the “Atelier de Definition”.

Ian Ritchie took part in the final jury session for the Ile Seguin competition on 5 October. The final 4 were:

• Equipe Dominique Perrault - Daniel Buren - Coyne & Bellier - Claude Ripault - Jean Claude Lamoureux
• Equipe Nicolas Michelin - Jan Kopp - Bertrand Segers - Antonio Gallego - Patrick Rimoux - BATISERF - Michel Forgue
• Equipe Mathieu Poitevin - Pascal Reynaud - Stéphane Maupin - Jérôme Sans - Daniel Vaniche
• Equipe Bernard Tschumi - Michel Crespin - TECHNIP TPS - Hugh Dutton - PROGRAMME

The winner was: Equipe Mathieu Poitevin - Pascal Reynaud

On 25 October, Ian Ritchie was on the judging panel for the AMC / Le Moniteur Awards, French architecture’s equivalent of the British RIBA Stirling Prize.
The winner was: was the National Dance Centre, Pantin Paris, by Antoinette Robain and Claire Guieysse.

The Spire was shortlisted for the Stirling Prize 2004 (bookies second favourite) together with the Kunsthaus, Graz by Peter Cook and Colin Fournier, Imperial War Museum North, Manchester by Studio Daniel Libeskind, Phoenix Initiative, Coventry by MacCormac Jamieson Prichard, Business Academy Bexley by Foster and Partners, and 30 St Mary Axe by Foster and Partners. The winner was 30 St Mary Axe and was announced at an award ceremony at the Old Billingsgate Market, London and was televised live on Channel 4 at 8pm, Saturday 16 October.

Ian Ritchie Architects have been commissioned by the Royal Shakespeare Company to help design the RSC’s 1000 seat thrust stage auditorium which will be used during the transition period while the existing main theatre is reconstructed. A planning application will be made before the end of this year and will be in use from 2006.

Four architects from our practice took part in an architectural design project for children organised by Crossrail London Rail Links. A series of workshops to design a “gateway” to Crossrail at the Isle of Dogs for gifted and talented children at Canary Wharf’s offices started on 29 September.
The four architects led discussions on the topic “what is design”. The following workshop involved visits to places of architectural interest with one architect from each participating practice taking a group of children to a place of interest of their choice. The workshops will culminate in a presentation of the chidren’s work on 1 December.

The RIBA have put TR2 Plymouth Theatre Royal Production Centre and The Spire forward for consideration for the European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture: Mies Van Der Rohe Award 2005. The primary objective of this official prize of the European Union is to recognise and commend works of contemporary architecture that are characterised by their conceptual, aesthetical and technical solutions. The works are nominated by a group of independent experts as well as the European national architects associations. For each biennial edition, the jury chooses from these nominations a single work to be granted the prize and a single work by emerging architects that will be given the special mention. In addition, the jury makes a selection of works to be published in the award catalogue and presented in a touring exhibition.

The practice’s participation in the 9^th Venice Biennale of Architecture provided the opportunity for the second office trip of the year on 30-31 October.

The winner of the Premio Lecco Prize (a competition between Diploma students from Beijing University, Hanyang University, Milan Polytechnic, and the Paris La Villette Schools of Architecture), was a team from Hanyang University in Seoul.

The 9th Venice Architecture Biennale at which Ian Ritchie Architects are represented in the British Pavilion, opened to the press on 9 September and to the public on 12 September. It continues until 7 November.

On 15 September Ian Ritchie was the guest assessor at the judging of the Leeds Award for Architecture 2004. The awards are sponsored this year by the Leeds Chamber of Commerce’s Property Forum and involve the Leeds Architecture and Design Initiative, The Leeds Society of Architects, The Landscape Institute, The Institute of Historic Building Conservation, Leeds Civic Trust and the Development Department of Leeds City Council. Ian Ritchie will announce the results and give a short presentation at the awards ceremony to be held at The Royal Armouries in Leeds on 20 January 2005.

Ian Ritchie with Jim Barrett of Dublin City Council is presenting The Spire project at the RIBA Annual Conference, ‘Good Clients = Good Architecture’, which is taking place at Trinity College Dublin on 9th and 10th July 2004.

Ian Ritchie has been invited to be President of the jury for the Compasso Volante international competition for students in Italy in September 2004.

The Spire of Dublin has received a RIBA Award.

Ian Ritchie Architects have been invited by the British Council to exhibit at the Venice Biennale 2004. Professor Peter Cook will be curating the exhibition.

The British Museum has appointed Ian Ritchie from Ian Ritchie Architects to act as an advisor on its space planning operations.

Ian Ritchie Architects ‘works outing’ this year is over the weekend of May 8/9^th in Dublin to see the Spire, and to enjoy Ireland’s revitalised capital city which has just hosted its first European event having taken over the Presidency of Europe.

A Public Inquiry will take place from April 29th to assess the planning application for the development of disused land adjacent to Potters Fields.

Ian Ritchie will give a talk in Chania, Crete on Saturday 25^th April during the conference organised by the Centre for Mediterranean Architecture. Other speakers include Alexandros Tambiazis, Michael Hopkins, Herve Descottes (US) and Professor David Lowe. The conference is sponsored by leading lighting companies including Artemide and Erco.

A statement regarding the British Museum will be issued within the next few weeks.

On Friday 30 January 2004, Ian Ritchie presided over the Jury for the New International Albums for Young Architects in Paris. Following an address by the Minister for Culture, Jean-Jacques Aillagon, Ian Ritchie announced the 13 winning teams selected by the jury for the quality of their projects, the pertinence of their architectural proposals, both urban and landscape, and their capacity for innovation.

The 13 teams selected were: Jérôme de Alzua Architecture, Colboc-Franzen : Benjamin Colboc et Manuela Franzen, Colomer-Dumont : Maria Colomer-Betoret et Adrien Dumont, Atelier Fernandez-Serres : Ivry Serres et Stéphane Fernandez, Karine Herman, Lan Architecture : Benoit Jallon et Umberto Napolitano, Llamata+Berthier/LLB Architecture : David Llamata et Charles Berthier, Pangalos Dugasse : Agissilaos Pangalos et Sylvie Dugasse, Jean-Christophe Quinton, Rathle & Duron : Julien Rathle et Sébastien Duron, Tomorrow : Florent Rougemont et Matthieu Brutsaert, Clément Vergély, Wonderland.productions : Sébastien Chabbert, Frédéric Guillierme, Jean-Marie Pouliquen, Alexander Sachse, Arnaud Vialla

CABE have produced a guide entitled: ‘Creating Excellent Buildings: a guide for clients’. To obtain a copy, contact CABE at: enquiries@cabe.org.uk. Alternatively, a PDF version of the guide can be downloaded from: www.cabe.org.uk/publications.

In conjunction with the publication of the guide, CABE are running six free events from November 2003 to March 2004. Please see www.cabe.org.uk for further details.

Ian Ritchie is one of six architect members of the jury for the Ile Seguin "Façade-enveloppe" Design Competition taking place this year in Boulogne-Billancourt, France. The other architects are Tadao Ando, Xavier de Geyter, François Grether, Michel Desvignes and Jean Nouvel.

CABE will be administering the UK’s participation in the next Europan competition (No 8), and appointing a new chairman. Ian Ritchie chaired Europan UK from 1997 having succeeded Richard Rogers.