A Very Stirling Affair Trivia Quiz

Answer: 1996

The Stirling Prize is much younger than people often think. It is named after Sir James Frazer Stirling, who is generally accepted to be one of the most influential architects of the second half of the 20th century. Prior to 1996 architects were given The Building of the Year Award.

His designs include the Andrew Melville Hall, St Andrews, and the History Faculty Building at Cambridge. The prize is the architectural equivalent of the Booker Prize, and is the one that every architect wants on their c.v.

The winner is chosen from six short listed buildings and these buildings and the award ceremony receive much media coverage.

Answer: Waterloo International

Designed by Grimshaw Architects, Waterloo International was built to accommodate the Eurostar train service from London to Paris and Brussels via the Channel Tunnel. Eurostar offers a fast and convenient service which competes very well with the air service, if you take into account things like check-in times and having to find your way to Heathrow Airport.

Following the move by Eurostar to St Pancras International in 2007, Waterloo International is being converted to domestic use.

Answer: Gateshead Millennium Bridge

The Gateshead Millennium Bridge was lifted into place in one piece in November 2000 by one of the world's largest floating cranes, Asian Hercules II. Owing to its shape, it is often called the 'Winking' or 'Blinking Eye Bridge". It is a cyclist and pedestrian tilt bridge which spans the River Tyne between the Gateshead Arts Quarter and the Newcastle on Tyne Quayside.

Answer: Lords Cricket Ground

Future Systems designed this building for Lords Cricket Ground, and with its pale-blue upholstered interior (inspired by a 1950s Chevrolet) it offers both a practical and luxurious venue for the press and media.

The pod was built in a Cornish shipyard, disassembled, and rebuilt on site.

Answer: The Gherkin

The official name of the building is '30 St Mary Axe', but such is its shape that it has been called 'The Gherkin' right from the beginning.

At 180m, The Gherkin is one of the tallest buildings in London, and is amongst a rash of modern buildings changing the skyline. It has 41 floors and accommodates offices and a bar and restaurants, and sits on land previously occupied by the Baltic Exchange, which was dismantled after being badly bombed in 1992 by the Provisional IRA.

Answer: The Scottish Parliament Building at Holyrood

Designed by a Catalan architect, Enric Miralles of EMBT & RMJM, the cost of the building at £414 million was vastly over its estimated £10-£40million. It was begun in 1999 and opened in 2004, and was criticized right from the outset because it used non-indigenous materials such as Chinese granite instead of the local product. An enquiry begun in 2003 criticized the whole management of the project, but architectural and academic experts praised it in extravagant terms.
The building is set within the Edinburgh UNESCO World Heritage Site and was awarded the Stirling Prize in 2005.

Answer: National Museum of 21st Century Arts, Rome

Zaha Hadid was the first woman to win the prestigious Pritker Architecture Prize, which she did in 2004. Her designs are futuristic, and possibly not to everyone's taste. She is, however, one of the few women working in the field of architecture to come to national notice.

Her work is international and can be seen from Japan, where she re-designed the National Olympic Stadium, to her native Iraq, where she was commissioned to design the new building for the Central Bank of Iraq. She designed the Olympic Aquatic Centre for the 2012 London Olympics, but this was not nominated for the Stirling Prize in that year.

Answer: Falkirk Wheel

The prize was jointly awarded to RMJM and the husband and wife partnership EMBT, who also designed the Scottish Parliament Building. The other nominees in 2005 included the BMW Central Building in the German city of Leipzig and the Lewis Glucksman Gallery in Cork, Ireland.

The Falkirk Wheel links the Forth and Clyde Canal and the Union Canal by rotating to lift boats from one to the other, a fantastic feat of engineering!

Answer: Eden Project

The full title of the Magna Centre is the 'Magna Science Adventure Centre'; it primarily acts as a fun educational aid for young children. The centre is hosted within a disused steelworks and the site also used to be a Roman fort. It is also used for large events such as concerts and conferences. The Magna Centre was designed by the Wilkinson Eyre architectural practice.

The Eden Project is a collection of huge dome shaped greenhouses, home to plants from around the world. It was designed by Nicholas Grimshaw and Anthony Hunt.

Answer: University of Cambridge

The full title of the laboratory is the Sainsbury Laboratory Cambridge University, and it is used as part of the botanic garden at the university, primarily for research into plant growth. The University of Cambridge was founded in the 13th Century, making it the second oldest in the UK, after the University of Oxford.