Journal Posts - Jamie Fobert Architects

Currently in our galleries at Kettle’s Yard is a selling exhibition, Artists for Kettle’s Yard, with donated works by Rana Begum, Antony Gormley, Jennifer Lee, Veronica Ryan, Megan Rooney, Caroline Walker and many other contemporary artists, as well as renowned 20^th Century artists such as Ben Nicholson and Lucie Rie.

Among the works are two watercolour studies by Jamie Fobert, which explore the shifting tones of glazed ceramic panels intended for the façade of a building, their linear austerity and softness inspired by the work of Agnes Martin.

Artists for Kettle’s Yard is free and on show at Kettle’s Yard from 14 March – 12 April 2026. All works are for sale and all proceeds will go towards the Jim and Helen Ede Fund.

V&A Dundee is celebrating 30 years of Maggie’s with a free exhibition celebrating the pioneering design of the much-loved cancer care centres.

Thirty years ago, after learning her cancer had returned, designer, gardener and writer Maggie Keswick Jencks dreamt of spaces that would help people “to not lose the joy of living in the fear of dying”. Now, more than 30 Maggie’s centres exist across the UK and beyond, offering a haven of emotional, practical, and psychological support to those affected by cancer.

The exhibition features films and stories highlighting the incredible work staff at each centre do to improve the lives of people living with cancer, alongside the work of the architects who designed these buildings. Jamie Fobert Architects is proud to be among them, and a model of our forthcoming Maggie’s for Coventry is among the exhibits.

Maggie’s: Architecture that Cares is free and on show at V&A Dundee in the Michelin Design Gallery from 6 March 2026 until 1 November 2026.

In December, to round off the year, our team visited Chillida Leku, a unique museum created during the lifetime of sculptor Eduardo Chillida. Located near San Sebastián in Chillida’s native Basque region, the Leku site — comprising a restored farmhouse and an 11-hectare sculpture park — is a great work of art in itself. We were fortunate to be guided by Mikel Chillida, who beautifully described his grandfather’s character, artistic values, and achievements.

Afterwards, we walked along the coastal path to Chillida’s Comb of the Wind (1976), a trio of monumental steel sculptures jutting from the rocks above the boisterous Cantabrian Sea.

Photographs by Thomas.

The RIBA Journal has featured our sustainability-focused work at the Royal Observatory Greenwich, highlighting our collaboration with structural engineers Price & Myers to create a new multi-functional space built in lower-carbon concrete.

The new Astronomers’ Court balances sustainability, functionality and beauty. We are exploring the use of calcined clay in our concrete mixes and using structural geometry to drive efficiency, as well as to create a striking and welcoming public space. The RIBJ says, “the decision to embrace experimentation on such a prestigious and historic project is admirable. The approach feels apt for a site founded on invention and discovery.”

Read more about our project here.

On Friday 17 October, Jamie will be participating in a symposium hosted by the AA to celebrate the living legacy of his friend and architectural critic, Joseph Rykwert, on the first anniversary of his death. The symposium coincides with the publication of an expanded edition of Joseph’s book, Remembering Places: A Memoir.

Date: Friday 17 October 2025
Time: 10:00 – 19:00
Location: AA Lecture Hall, 36 Bedford Square
Book free tickets: here

We are very pleased to support Open City’s ‘Young City Makers‘, which pairs architectural practices with London primary schools. The scheme enables young students to develop their collaboration and model-making skills and helps them understand their role in shaping their city.

In this year’s workshops, children set out to reimagine how their school could be more playful. Taking inspiration from their field trip to Coal Drops Yard, they also gave consideration to amenities, circulation, who they were designing for, how they want the spaces to feel and how they could be informed by their favourite or dream play spaces.

The children JFA worked with created some wonderful, imaginative work and were the winners of the Community Prize in the awards ceremony at Westminster City Hall.

The Royal Observatory Greenwich is celebrating its 350^th anniversary with the announcement of its new architecture and landscape.

Jamie Fobert Architects, with a brilliant design team including FFLO, Purcell, Max Fordham and Price & Myers, has been tasked with considering how best to add to this important historic site to better welcome visitors, give clarity to the visitor journey and to create galleries where the full story of time and space can be revealed. Over the past 6 months, the project has achieved Planning Permission from the Royal Borough of Greenwich, Listed Building Consent and Scheduled Monument Consent, and the project has been reviewed by UNESCO and ICOMOS.

Pictured is the Astronomers’ Court, a new multi-functional space for exhibitions and ‘science busking’. Read more about the project here.

One of our study models for the Royal Observatory Greenwich is displayed in this year’s Royal Academy Summer Exhibition. The model is a reflected ceiling for the proposed new Astronomers’ Court, cast in pigmented Jesmonite.

If you’re at the exhibition, look out also for Eric Parry’s beautiful sectional perspective drawing, created as part of the collaborative submission by Jamie Fobert Architects and Eric Parry Architects for the British Museum Western Range architectural competition.

The Royal Academy Summer Exhibition is now open until Sunday 17th August.

Competition proposals have been published from the five teams shortlisted to design a new National Memorial for Queen Elizabeth II, in St James’ Park.

We are collaborating with Tom Stuart Smith-Studio and Adam Lowe of Factum Arte to create a memorial for Queen Elizabeth II which will honour her life and legacy through a landscape of storytelling around objects from the world she lived in. The central composition is formed by an exact cast of an awe-inspiring oak from Windsor Great Park, representing her strength, endurance and the historic place of the monarchy in our constitution. Here is our competition film, prepared by fellow team-members, Holmes Studio.

The National Portrait Gallery has received a Civic Trust Award and has been Highly Commended in this year’s Selwyn Goldsmith Award, which recognises projects that demonstrate excellent universal design principles.

The judges said, “This redesign is a triumph. It has not only revitalised a historic building but has made it more accessible and inclusive for all, creating a cultural hub that truly belongs to the people.”

Pictured: Hellen Siu and Tom Clark from JFA, alongside fellow teammate George Reed, Structural Engineer from Price&Myers.

©Wayne Myers Photography

In a collaboration formed with Tom Stuart-Smith Studio and Adam Lowe of Factum Arte, Jamie Fobert Architects is part of one of five design teams shortlisted to design a memorial to The Late Queen. Other shortlisted teams include Foster + Partners with Yinka Shonibare and Heatherwick Studio with Halima Cassell.

The site for the new national Queen Elizabeth II Memorial will include the area of St James’s Park adjacent to The Mall at Marlborough Gate, and land surrounding the pathway down to the lake, including the Blue Bridge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to the ceremonial route of The Mall, its historical and constitutional significance and personal connection to Queen Elizabeth.

The winning design team will be announced later this year.

Ahead of the announcement of the RIBA Stirling Prize winner on 16 October, RIBA is hosting two ‘Stirling Stories’ events, in London and Leeds, to celebrate the six shortlisted buildings. Architects from each of the projects will reveal more about their work in insightful presentations, followed by a panel discussion and a live audience question and answer session.

Jamie Fobert will be joined by Liz Smith from Purcell (Heritage Architects) and Pippa Nissen of Nissen Richards (Interpretation Designers) to talk about the National Portrait Gallery.

Thursday 3 October 2024, 6:30pm to 9.30pm @ RIBA, 66 Portland Place, London, W1B 1AD

Thursday 10 October, 2024, 5pm to 9pm @The Everyman Cinema, Leeds

We are thrilled to announce that we have been shortlisted as one of the five architect-led consultant teams that will compete in the International Architectural Competition for The British Museum’s Western Range Galleries.

Eric Parry Architects and Jamie Fobert Architects’ collaborative team will bring a dynamic approach to creating the best contemporary museum spaces within historically significant buildings.

We will be joined by: Buro Happold, David Bonnett Associates, Max Fordham, Mima, Price and Myers, Purcell, Space Syntax and Studio ZNA.

We are delighted that the National Portrait Gallery has been shortlisted for the RIBA Stirling Prize 2024.

The judges said, “A seamless blend of contemporary design and conservation of historical elements reinvigorate this Grade I*-listed cultural institution. Visitor experience is enhanced by a welcoming new entrance of bronze doors featuring hand-drawn portraits by Tracey Emin, along with a light-filled learning centre and accessible public space carved from former offices. The entrance reorientates the gallery towards the bustling West End, on which its back was previously turned, while crucial accessibility alterations have opened the building to all, including an entrance ramp and wider doorways. Careful interventions, such as using original windows to form new doorways, exemplify a harmony between heritage and adaptability.”

Jamie Fobert Architects has vacancies for an architectural assistant and/or an interior designer to join our London studio.

We are keen to meet candidates with: an intuitive understanding of 3D space; a keen interest in materiality; self-motivation, enthusiasm, adaptability and an ability to work well as part of a team; high proficiency working in Rhino and 3D rendering software (V-Ray or similar).

To apply for this opportunity, please send by Thursday 7 August 2024: a cover letter introducing yourself, outlining your motivation and highlighting relevant experience; a CV, detailing your education, work experience, software skills and languages; a concise illustrated portfolio.

All enquiries and applications to: recruitment@jamiefobertarchitects.com

The National Portrait Gallery, by Jamie Fobert Architects and Purcell, is one of 15 projects shortlisted for 2024’s AR Public Awards.

This year’s shortlist includes a range of projects across the world, from India to Ireland, and from Mexico to Tanzania, from seaside baths in Dublin, Ireland to a border crossing in Agua Prieta, Mexico and a centre for Syrian refugees in Turkey. The judges were looking for a shortlist that not only celebrates ‘design and landscape architecture within the site, but also how the site interacts with the wider city or surrounding context’.

Our project for the National Portrait Gallery added only 50m2 of new-build space and, yet, by opening up lost and underused existing spaces, a vast 959m2 of publicly accessible space was added. Since reopening in June 2023, the Gallery’s visitor numbers have been transformed. Incidental visits have increased by 56%, indicating that the entrance is more visible and welcoming. And 93% of visitors agreed the Gallery is ‘for everyone’, fulfilling the ambition to make the Gallery accessible and welcoming to the widest and most diverse audience. We are delighted that the National Portrait Gallery’s new, welcoming public spaces have been recognised by AR Public, alongside so many wonderful international projects.

We are thrilled that the National Portrait Gallery has been shortlisted for The Art Fund, Museum of the Year, 2024. The NPG has been announced as one of five finalists along with an outstanding group of museums and galleries from across the nation. The prize is as much, if not more, for the programme and the outreach to communities than for their architectural reinvention. I cannot express enough my admiration for the NPG learning and audience & community teams who have made the most of the new spaces since the reopening. From the end of June until the end of February, when these figures were released: 1.4 million visits +31% on pre closure First time visitors +66%, Families +61%, Aged 16-34 +34% and... for me an incredibly moving statistic... Disabled visitors +357% in comparison to pre-closure It makes all the hard work and care so very worth while. @nationalportraitgallery @artfund @historicengland @dcmsgovuk @nicholascullinan @nissenrichardsstudio @purcell.architecture @priceandmyers @maxfordhamllp #artfund #museumoftheyear #portrait #portraitphotography #art #sculpture #historic #historicfabric #public #access #forall #space

The National Portrait Gallery has been announced as one of five finalists shortlisted for this year’s Art Fund Museum of the Year, the world’s biggest museum prize.

Jenny Waldman, the director of Art Fund, described the shortlist as “shining examples of the impact museums are making locally and nationally. Each of our finalists truly has something for everyone … These organisations are all real leaders in their field. I urge everyone to go and visit these extremely special spaces.”

The National Portrait Gallery reopened to the public in June 2023 after its most significant transformation since 1896, comprising a complete redisplay of its Collection and a major refurbishment of its building. Led by Jamie Fobert Architects, the architectural project included the creation of new public spaces, a more welcoming visitor entrance and a state-of-the-art Learning Centre.

One final post about my recent @scaffold_podcast , episode 98 @blndrfld Matthew Blunderfield took me right back to my student days to discuss my final University of Toronto project which was a reworking of St James Town. This cluster of poorly built 1960’s modernist towers were by 1986 already being considered for demolition. With Delirious New York in hand, I proposed to remove two towers to create a central park and build three more to form a strong periphery (image 3) Stripping the substandard cladding away and working with the existing concrete structure, long before 'Adaptive reuse' was coined. This strategy allowed the project to focus on the freeing the ground plain (image 4) and imbedding public functions into the unified underground floors; a school, a sports centre, cinemas, even rehousing the existing police station and a subterranean club modeled loosely on the baths of Diocletian (bottom right) (image 5) I used (very rough) photo montage to explore conceptual ideas. The first was about the complexes original aspiration of swinging 60's Toronto (image 1), and the final photo montage was a critique of the Miesian dream of the modern nuclear family, even the tea pot and stereo are Mies towers. If you look closely Mies is on the telly. All the drawings were hand drawn (there were no computers then) in ink on mylar, a plastic paper with a fine opaque surface. Working on one sheet for weeks at a time, building it up slowly, was one of the benefits of pre-computer architectural practice. Image 6, is a 3d drawings, a view of the lobby, drawn in red and green in two overlapping perspectives. When viewed with 3d glasses the two images merge and create the illusion of depth. This, rather mad, idea lead to me being given the graduating drawing prize of $1,000 which I set aside to pay for my flight and accommodation to come to London the following year. #architecture #modernism #toronto #stjamestown #drawing #architecturaldrawing #handdrawing #towers #miesvanderrohe #delerious #distopia