Holyrood beats all comers again for architecture

IT MAY have been delivered three years late and 11 times over budget - but the controversial £431m Scottish parliament has now been recognised in a prestigious architectural award as Scotland's best public building.

Despite continuing problems with the building, it won the top prize at the Scottish Design Awards on Friday evening, carrying home the title of Scotland's best publicly funded building.

Its futuristic design, which the late Spanish architect Enric Miralles famously based on upturned boats, was praised by judges who also awarded the building their overall "architecture grand prix" award.

The Scottish parliament beat the Performance Academy at Newcastle College, a venue for concerts, and the new Sandy Road Health Clinic in Glasgow.

Miralles' widow, Benedetta Tagliabue, was in Glasgow to pick up the prize on Friday, alongside Tony Kettle of the late Catalan architect's Edinburgh-based partners RMJM.

The award confirms the building's position as favourite to win the most prestigious British architecture award, the Stirling prize, to be held this October. The ceremony is to be held in Edinburgh, all but confirming the building as the winner.

It comes with the parliament having already been given Spain's greatest architectural prize in April by the VIII Biennale of Spanish Architecture - the Manuel de la Dehesa award.

A month earlier the parliament picked up the Edinburgh Architectural Association's prestigious centenary medal.

But while the bevy of awards will relieve the parliament's PR team as they struggle to put the controversy over the construction and its cost behind them, critics claim the building is being given prizes simply to compensate for its troubled birth.

Peter Wilson, director of the Manifesto Foundation at Napier University, said: "In the current political climate, everyone wants to be seen to be on side. The question is who will now have the courage not to give it an award?"

He added: "The parliament was always going to apply for every single award it could find as a way of legitimising a project that had such financial and political problems. The only thing left for them is to cover themselves in architectural glory.

"The architectural profession now must be seen to be on board. It is almost impossible in the current climate not to win the awards it goes in for," he went on.

The awards have been given despite the fact that the building is still mired in delays because of 2,000 faults.

Scotland on Sunday revealed earlier this month that problems to be fixed include leaky windows, jamming doors, peeling plaster and wall panels that keep falling off.

Despite the building being open for MSPs and debates, and for thousands of tourists and visitors, parts of it are still shrouded in scaffolding and each evening gangs of workers arrive to deal with the "snagging" problems.

In September, parliament chiefs said all faults should have been dealt with by the end of the year, but there is no end in sight, with builders expected to be in the complex throughout the summer, further delayed by the need to work around the parliament's daily schedule.

But the parliament's Presiding Officer, George Reid, claimed that the award was a "fitting tribute" to all those involved in the building's design.

"These latest architectural accolades from the Scottish Design Awards build on the parliament's strong international reputation as a design project of real significance.

"Holyrood's architectural awards and nominations are a fitting tribute to everyone who helped bring our parliament building to fruition."