Jury Overview

The process of awarding this year’s Harleston Parker Medal was shaped by ongoing, thoughtful conversations about how beauty is experienced, understood, and felt. The jury returned again and again to questions of invitation and access; storytelling and memory; comfort and transcendence; and the ways architecture listens to people, climate, context, and time.

This year’s jury brought together architects, designers, educators, preservation advocates, and creative directors. As in past years, the jury began by sharing personal reflections on beauty and concluded by asking a familiar question: What makes architecture beautiful today?

Is beauty something we see immediately, or something that unfolds over time? Is it found in aesthetics alone, or in how a building wraps around its users? The jury agreed that the answer is both. Beauty emerges in architecture that welcomes its users and teaches them how to experience it; that wraps around the body through light, temperature, and material; and that offers comfort without requiring struggle.

Across discussions, the jury returned to projects that do more than satisfy programmatic needs. Beauty was recognized in projects that creatively address issues of our time. Projects that tell stories through design choices and materials, excel through constraints, and transform limitations into opportunities for meaningful and often surprising impact all strengthened this year’s criteria for beauty. 

With differing perspectives, the jury ultimately aligned around a shared understanding of beauty as something that transcends problem-solving alone. Beautiful architecture shifts perception, changes discourse, and renews our collective sense of what is possible.