.jpg)
The end of year show celebrates work across all year groups and showcases speculative ideas that challenge conventional approaches to the built environment.
On the 9 and 10 of June, architecture students displayed their projects in the Keith Green Building, Hewson Building and MArch Studios.
Projects at the show included looking at existing memorials, regeneration of urban areas, and marine conservation.
Charlotte Hall, studying an architecture Master’s degree, focused on the design of an aquarium which challenges conventional aquarium typologies by immersing visitors within a living aquatic environment rather than enclosing marine life.
In her design, species move freely through the site, with protected aquarium zones supporting endangered populations before reintroduction into the harbour ecosystem.
Research and laboratory facilities enhance local marine conservation, extending ecological impact beyond the site.
Alongside this, wellness spaces, including spa and fitness environments, allow visitors to experience the physical and psychological benefits of a thriving aquatic landscape. Together, the project establishes a symbiotic relationship between human and marine systems, promoting stewardship and environmental resilience.
Reuben Wild, a student on the undergraduate architecture degree, focused on the former Burmeister & Wain dockyard in Refshaleøen, which is a significant memorial to the Industrial and Maritime history of Copenhagen. Marked by profound innovation, tight-knit communities and explosive creativity, the traces and artefacts of this past are exhibited in a cross-programmed campus.
The Secondary School, housed in renovated dockyard buildings, is optimised for many learning activities. Designed for use around the clock by the whole community, the school provides meaning and unplanned social interaction to reduce loneliness in the lives of local Danes.
Dora Banda, also an undergraduate student, completed a project called ‘Grounded Movement’ which looks at an underground sports centre in Nicosia, Cyprus. Following a major conflict in 1974, intergenerational trauma has been carried by Greek and Turkish Cypriots and stored within the body. The project responds to barriers in sport that affects the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, whose athletes cannot compete under their own flag.
The building sits within the arrow-shaped Venetian wall fortifications in the United Nations Buffer Zone (a demilitarised area that splits the city in half), acting as a contemporary city gate between North and South Nicosia.
Building underground symbolises healing from the deep scars caused by the conflict. A fully enclosed running tunnel permeates the building across levels, creating chance encounters between communities through movement. The project highlights that sport serves as the common language that politics has failed to provide.
Lauren Cadwgn, also a Masters student, explored the regeneration of Nyhamnen, Malmö, through a three-phase design process that progressively scales from urban strategy to architectural and technical resolution.
Drawing on the area’s rich maritime heritage, particularly its history as one of the world’s largest shipbuilding centres and its longstanding relationship with the fishing industry, the proposal seeks to reconnect the site with the skills, crafts and culture that once defined it. The project establishes a sustainable ecosystem of living, learning and production focused on reviving industrial and maritime skills.
.jpg)
The show offers an insight into student work at all levels of scale and complexity, focusing on their main design projects but supplemented with supporting work.
In their first year, students focus on the theme of ‘Identity’ with the Home project, which requires the students to design an integrated home/workshop for a fictional individual of their own invention.
In year two, students scale up and explore the theme of ‘Community’ via the Exclusion/Inclusion in the City project, where they design a library and community centre for the city of Hartlepool with the aim of galvanising social engagement.
In their final year, students explore the theme of ‘Diversity’. Here the students are given the freedom to explore projects that matter to them under the umbrella of research-informed design labs with their own distinctive agendas and approaches.
Across both studios, students critically explored the relationship between urban-life, space, and architecture. Students develop a research-led design approach that responds to social, environmental, and economic conditions of site.
The show also saw a number of awards presented to students, in recognition of their hard work and outstanding designs. Some of these awards were also awarded based on the key themes of the show and highlighted the students' attention to detail. The winners of these awards were:
Part A
1. Best Home Project: Paulina Lis
2. Outstanding Y1 Performance: Emily Spicer-Gregory
3. Best Technical Design: Max Quarman
4. Best Model: Paulina Lis
Part B
1. Sustainability: Christine Yu
2. Best Part B Final Project: Hannah Smith
3. Best Contextual Response: Hannah Smith
4. Enhancing Lives by Design: Amelia Fettis
Part C
1. Unsung Hero: Chloe Coullomb
2. Diversity and Inclusivity: Keith Lo
3. People and Planet: Stephanie Pereira
4. LRSA President’s Prize: Maxwell Cantrell
5. Placemaking: Thomas Cox
6. Best model: Hannah Kinninburgh
7. Outstanding Design Concept: Paul Kroeze
8. Best Overall Graduating Project: Reuben Wild
9. SAI Young Architectural Illustrator Prize 2026: Stephanie Pereira
M1
1. Best Hand drawing: Megan Francis
2. CLEAN Award: Megan Francis
3. Best M1 project: Megan Francis
4. Best use of Materials, colours and Textures: Katy Staniforth
M2
1. LRSA President's prize: Charlotte Hall
2. Best fire safety: Yagoda Smulska
3. Best graduating project: Charlotte Hall
4. Riba East Midlands: Lauren Cadwgan
5. Jicwood Prize: Connie Denman
More information about Loughborough University’s architecture degrees and courses can be found here.