Kevin McCloud played it for laughs, Tom Dyckhoff introduced us to his modish new black-rimmed specs, Ruth Reed was a picture of professional composure, Richard Hastilow bowed out in style, Kieran Long dissed the shortlist again, and everybody fell in love with Benedetta Tagliabue.

But this year’s Stirling Prize belonged to just one person: Richard Rogers.

It wasn’t enough to have two buildings on the shortlist – the Protos winery in Spain and the (winning) Maggie’s Centre in Hammersmith. It wasn’t even enough to have the whole ceremony taking place in the Rogers-converted Old Billingsgate fishmarket. No, the icing on the cake for Rogers was that he received the £20,000 winner’s cheque from his estranged former business partner (and past president of the RIBA) Marco Goldschmied. 

Marco deserves bucketloads of congratulations – firstly for riding to the rescue of the Stirling prize (the money for which he matches with an equal sum to Amnesty International) and secondly, for actually getting up on stage to hand over the envelope to Richard. The two men managed a handshake, but it’s fair to say there wasn’t a lot of chemistry between the two. Unless it was of the nuclear kind. Marco had looked rather more relaxed helping present the earlier Stephen Lawrence award to the wild-haired Simon Conder for his excellent Dungeness beach house. But he’s a pro, is Marco, and his support for the Prize, the Stephen Lawrence Trust, and Amnesty are long-term, so we’re all considerably in his debt.

Most missed person on the night (apart from Maggie Keswick Jencks, whose original idea led to the Maggie’s Centres programme) was Ivan Harbour, Rogers’ co-director and project architect for the winning building. But Harbour was away on family duty, so it was Richard – who had been a friend of the late Maggie – who took to the stage alone.

Final commiserations must of course go to the runners-up: AHMM for their Kentish town polyclinic, BDP for their Liverpool One masterplan (involving at least 20 other architects in the build-out), Eric Parry for his Aldermanbury Square city office building, Graham Stirk of Rogers Stirk Harbour for his Renzo Piano-influenced Protos winery – and above all to Tony Fretton, whose Fuglsang Kunstmuseum in Denmark had been the bookies’ choice throughout. It’s always tough being the Stirling favourite, as Sir Nicholas Grimshaw (notoriously overlooked for his Eden Project) can testify. 

But this unpredictability is all part of the appeal. Let the carpers carp, let the knockers knock. An hour of primetime Saturday night telly devoted to architecture? The Stirling Prize is brilliant. 

From earlier this year: Stirling Prize winners Rogers, Stirk and Harbour talk to RIBAJ editor Hugh Pearman.
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