Drawing from an Architect’s Perspective: Interview with Ken Shuttleworth to Mark 5 years of The Architecture Drawing Prize

This short essay, written by the author and critic Jonathan Glancey, coincides with the launch of the inaugural Architecture Drawing Prize – a competition curated by the World Architecture Festival, the Sir John Soane's Museum, and Make. The deadline for the award is the 17th of September 2021.

Drawing from an Architect’s Perspective:  Interview with Ken Shuttleworth to Mark 5 years of The Architecture Drawing Prize
Jørn Utzon's competition submission drawing number 11956, Jørn Utzon | Hellebæk, Denmark.. Image Courtesy of State Archives, NSW Jørn Utzon's competition submission drawing number 11956, Jørn Utzon | Hellebæk, Denmark.. Image Courtesy of State Archives, NSW

This short essay, written by the author and critic Jonathan Glancey, coincides with the launch of the inaugural Architecture Drawing Prize – a competition curated by the World Architecture Festival, the Sir John Soane's Museum, and Make. The deadline for the award is the 17th of September 2021.

“Is graphicacy a word?” asks Ken Shuttleworth, founder of Make Architects and instigator of The Architecture Drawing Prize. It is. “Like literacy”, he says, “, it’s certainly what I’m interested in when looking at and judging drawings. It’s about a fluency in making and understanding them.” The Architecture Drawing Prize is in its fifth year now. “We tend to see very few hand drawings by young architects - they mostly use computers - and, today, most architectural students come from more of a maths and physics than an art background. I still believe, though, that hand drawing is very important.”

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