Local architecture students impressed professionals with their creative concepts for Broadgate. Every year, the Broadgate Prize offers students at the University of East London opportunities to work collaboratively on real-life designs for Broadgate – from creating welfare facilities for the team at 1 Finsbury Avenue to exhibitions for the London Festival of Architecture. These are then presented in a realistic setting to teams from British Land and Sir Robert McAlpine.
Broadgate is British Land’s 32 acre campus in central London. Now entering its sixth year, the Broadgate Prize is a successful collaboration between British Land, Sir Robert McAlpine and the University of East London, supported by architects Allford Hall Monaghan Morris (AHMM) and ScottWhitbyStudio.
Charlie Horne of British Land, Samantha Lee of Sir Robert McAlpine and Alex Scott-Whitby of the University of East London and ScottWhitbyStudio reflect on the value of the Broadgate Prize for young people, the impact on their organisations and the importance of diversity for the sector.
Life changing opportunities
Alex:I can’t overstate the importance of the Broadgate Prize for our students. It helps young people who could otherwise be overlooked to build networks and access life changing opportunities. The University of East London is not your usual school of architecture. 72% of our students identify from minority ethnic groups and 69% are the first generation of their family to go to university. That’s very different to the typical architect, who tends to be a white, middle-class man, whose parents are professionals and who got a job through their networks (me included).
Charlie: British Land’s 10-year framework to transform Broadgate with Sir Robert McAlpine provides a unique chance for us to engage with our local community. Part of that is around education. So, we began working with the University of East London, our local university, about five years ago. Every year, the students come up with incredible designs for different projects. The winners take home a cash prize and several have gone into paid placements with our architects AHMM.
Samantha: The Broadgate Prize is the best kind of education engagement we can have. It’s embedded in the curriculum and there are real impacts at the end of it. Over 250 students entered this year and there were 36 finalists across six teams. Next year’s competition will be bigger than ever, offering hundreds of students the chance to design hoardings for 2 Finsbury Avenue, with the winners working with the Broadgate team to turn their designs into reality.
Alex: Opportunities like this change lives. All the winners have gone on to amazing things, earning more than the career average for our students. Typically, our graduates are underpaid and underemployed compared to those with equivalent qualifications from less diverse universities. This is because of their lack of professional networks. We are so grateful to British Land and Sir Robert McAlpine for encouraging diversity in the profession and giving our talented students the recognition they deserve.
Rewarding for the Broadgate team
Charlie: The Broadgate Prize is very rewarding for our team too. When you see these intelligent young people working collaboratively and building friendships, it’s wonderful. We could do with more of that as a society. I’m lucky to work for a business that’s passionate about education being part of development.
Samantha: We can learn so much from young people. The finalists put together fantastic presentations and schemes. I was impressed by their resilience, through everything that’s happened in the past 18 months. The value of cognitive diversity really shone through too, with all the teams coming at the project from different angles. Everybody should build diverse teams.
Making the world better
Alex: We’re trying to teach our students to make the world better, one drawing at a time. That takes a team approach, where the client, architect and contractor all work together. This is exactly what our students see through the Broadgate Prize. The Broadgate ethos is trust, honesty and collaboration –British Land and Sir Robert McAlpine live and breathe that. It’s also great there’s a real client at the end, so the concept of a client becomes real to our students, rather than an academic exercise.
People ask us: “How we can do more initiatives like this with industry?” The reality is it takes bravery. British Land and Sir Robert McAlpine were brave to work with us in this way and they’ve stuck with us through thick and thin. Across the 10-year framework, the Broadgate Prize will have a positive impact on hundreds if not thousands of students.
Samantha: I don’t think any of us could have had as much success with an initiative on our own. It shows how much more we can achieve working together.
Charlie: My daughter commented how intimidating it must be for the students presenting to us. But that’s really the prize. It’s not the money, it’s the opportunity to experience what architects do every day, to stand in front of a knowledgeable team and deliver a scheme that they will invest in.
Alex: British Land and Sir Robert McAlpine tell us that our diverse students are delivering at a level as good as or better than those from more well-known universities. When you put our students in a room, they blow stereotypes out of the water. I hope more companies take a risk on young people who face barriers.
Alex Scott-Whitby is Cluster Leader for Architecture and Physical Design at the University of East London and Director of ScottWhitbyStudio
Charlie Horne is Project Director at British Land
Samantha Lee is Community Manager at Sir Robert McAlpine
Student feedback
“This competition was a real eye-opening experience for me, it introduced me to the fast-paced working environment of life in a practice.”
“The competition provided me the chance to work with other people in the industry and I had a great experience working with my teammates. It gave us a taste of what working in the industry would actually be like and what to expect once we start working in our respective fields.”
“As a team of students and recent graduates it’s been an assault course in architecture and construction that has taken us beyond the confines of a normal practice.”
“The level of exposure we have received in a short time has led us to tackle challenges head on with confidence and perseverance, whilst growing professionally and personally.”
“We feel proud to be a part of this team and work in such an environment, winning the competition was just the start.”