AJ Small Projects 2024 Launch

On the panel, which was chaired by the AJ’s Fran Williams, was last year’s overall winner, Chris Upson of Belfast-based OGU Architects, and joint sustainability award winners Jeremy Ashworth of Ashworth Parkes Architects and Charlie Luxton of Charlie Luxton Design.

The conversation considered the importance of environmental and social sustainability in the success of projects on smaller budgets.

Upson discussed Adelaide Street in Belfast, a scheme designed in collaboration with MMAS, which saw a lane of traffic in the city replaced with a half-kilometre of urban garden and new public space. The scheme, designed for incidental play, offers a resource for local residents with little previous access to outdoor play space or gardens – and has unexpectedly created new biodiversity for central Belfast.

Read more here.