For many this is the proof that an engineer plus an artist, do not make an architect.
The Razzie to the Stirling’s Oscar, the Carbuncle Cup was launched seven years ago at the height of a building boom and seeks to highlight “quite how bad the very worst of British architecture can be.”
Organised by Building Design magazine, and named in honour of known architectural dilettante Prince Charles (who in 1982 referred to a proposed extension to the National Gallery as “a monstrous carbuncle on the face of an old friend”), nominations for the Cup are submitted by members of the public.
Fronting the ever-popular failed icon category appear Kapoor & Balmond’s Orbit, nominated not only for its unique ugliness but for the mockery it makes of London 2012’s claims to sustainability.
Joining it are two buildings that plumb new depths of inanity in their literal architectural expression. Belfast’s Titanic museum has been designed to resemble the collision of a ship and an iceberg. Shard End Library is a library with a shard sticking out its end.
The inclusion of the two high profile yet controversial London projects is not surprising. The ArcelorMittal Orbit tower has divided opinion since it was first proposed two years ago, while the new enclosure housing Cutty Sark has provoked furious reaction amongst conservationists and locals, particularly Andrew Gilligan, who derided the restoration as a a piece of “heartbreaking vandalism”.
Rounding out their list of horrors boasts three "wrist-slashingly awful" and the jury including BD columnists Owen Hatherley and Gillian Darley and executive editor, Ellis Woodman will work tirelessly over the next month to announcing an ultimate winner on August 24.
