'Pure delight': pioneering housing for older people awarded Stirling prize

Described as "a provision of pure delight", Appleby Blue Almshouse, a social housing complex for older people, has been named this year's winner of the RIBA Stirling prize.

- Catherine Slessor

With a vibe more in common with an Alpine spa hotel than the poky rooms and grim corridors more often associated with housing for elderly people, the design by Witherford Watson Mann architects reinvents the almshouse for the modern era as a place of care, shelter and social connection.

As a building type, the origins of almshouses extend back centuries, giving a semblance of dignity to the poor, the old, the sick and the marginalised. Sequestered from the outside world, with cellular dwellings arrayed around courtyards, they evoke a sense of pastoral benevolence.

For Witherford Watson Mann, the challenge was not only how to rethink the traditional almshouse form, but also how to look beyond the simple provision of housing, to conceive of it as the heart of a hosting network.

The client, United St Saviour's, a Southwark-based charity, is also a grant-making trust, supporting refugee groups and youth centres, as well as cultural organisations. The aim is that these will make use of the building's communal spaces, so it feels like an integral part of local life.