Stirling Prize winner to share insights on architecture at Shrewsbury lecture

Mae Architects founder Alex Ely will give a lecture on Wednesday at the Hive in Shrewsbury as part of the Shropshire Society of Architects’ spring lecture series.

Alex founded the London-based practice in 2001 and has led the practice as it has built an international reputation for excellence, culminating in the practice winning the coveted RIBA Stirling Prize in 2023 for the John Morden Centre, a senior daycare and medical centre at Morden College in south-east London.

The event is the third of a four-part lecture series that has already seen talks this year from other celebrated designers including Jamie Fobert of Jamie Fobert Architects and Ceri Edmonds from Alison Brooks Architects, the only practice to have won the holy trinity of architectural awards – the Stirling Prize, the Manser Medal and the Stephen Lawrence Prize.

The Shropshire Society of Architects can trace its origins back to the 1950s and has a long tradition of welcoming some of the UK’s most exciting architects and practices to participate in their twice-yearly lecture series.

The society is run by a committee made up of architects from across the county and the event series is organised by current chair Mark Newall and committee member Michael Cruise, who are both directors of Shrewsbury-based BCHN Architects.

Michael said: “It is a huge privilege to have Alex take part in our spring lecture series and we are incredibly fortunate that we continue to be able to attract such exciting talent to Shrewsbury to share with us their ideas and experiences.

“These lectures are a hugely important aspect of our commitment to promoting great design, not just to other architects but also to the wider public as our events are open to all and usually at least half the attendees do not come from the architectural sector.

“With all the proposed changes that we are likely to see in the years ahead, particularly around schemes like the new riverside in Shrewsbury, we want to ensure that great design is front and centre of the ongoing conversation about the built environment so that we are setting a high-quality threshold in terms of design that provides the long term legacy that Shrewsbury and the wider region deserves.”

Doors open at 6.30pm at the Hive on Milk Street for the lecture by Alex called ‘Towards a Resilient Architecture’. Tickets are £5 on the door and all are welcome.