Grafton Architects, the Dublin-based firm lead by 2020 Pritzker Prize laureates Yvonne Farrell and Shelley McNamara, has been selected for its second project at Kingston University London following its surprise 2021 Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) Stirling Prize win for the school’s Town House building. That project, a mixed-use higher education building defined by its precast concrete frame, soaring colonnaded facade, and wealth of social spaces, was also winner of the 2022 European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture–the Mies van der Rohe Award. (A somewhat bittersweet triumph as the final win for a United Kingdom–based project in terms of eligibility due to Brexit; Town House was also Grafton’s inaugural completed project in the UK.)

For Grafton’s return to Kingston University, the firm will develop an initial design concept for a new building and landscape upgrades at Middle Mill, a student housing–anchored complex adjacent to the Knight’s Park campus. Situated along the Hogsmill River in the southwest suburbs of London, Knight’s Park—one of four campuses that comprise Kingston University–is home to Kingston School of Art, including its architecture department. The forthcoming building and the firm’s much-heralded prior commission for Kingston won’t exactly be neighbors. Town House, completed in 2020, is located at the Penrhyn Road campus, less than a half-mile across the river from the Middle Mill site.