Cotter and Naessens Architects has taken Building of the Year in the Educational Over 10M category at the Building and Architect of the Year Awards 2026, earning recognition for a students centre that demonstrates what educational architecture can achieve when spatial thinking, material craft, and design ambition are pursued with consistency and conviction.

The University of Limerick Students Centre impressed the judges as one of the most resolved entries in this year's programme. The panel described it as "an exceptionally articulate piece of architecture," noting its clear spatial logic and confident, expressive design language as the qualities that set it apart from a competitive field. That clarity of intent — legible in plan, coherent in section, and consistent across every scale of detail — is precisely what distinguishes a truly accomplished building from one that is merely well executed in parts.

The strength of the design thinking is matched by the quality of its realisation. A refined material palette gives the building a sense of craft and permanence that rewards close attention, while the structural and spatial strategies in both plan and section reflect a level of architectural thinking that goes well beyond the organisational brief. Beautifully conceived and expertly delivered, the scheme holds its ambition from the earliest design decisions through to the finished building.

The communal spaces are equally well considered. In a students centre, the quality of shared and social environments is the measure by which the building will be judged by the people who use it every day. Cotter and Naessens Architects has given those spaces the care and generosity they deserve, producing environments that are genuinely inviting and that will support student life at the University of Limerick for years to come.

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