Improving our cultural offer and celebrating great architecture

We laid the foundations for the House of Architecture – our major investment programme. From bringing together our world–class collections and developing a virtual programme that will expand our digital reach and accessibility on a global scale, to the essential modernisation of our London landmark building – we made steady progress. We also continued to celebrate and showcase excellence through our globally standard–setting awards, talks, and exhibitions.

Public programme highlights included:

• curating and hosting concurrent exhibitions in London (Wide–Angle View, Building Contemporary China, Office Chic, President’s Medals, and displays for Disability Awareness and Saudi Arabia); in Manchester (Stirling Prize); in Newcastle (The Architect has Left the Building); and in Liverpool (Long Life Low Energy with Tate Liverpool)
• loaning 52 items to galleries in Sheffield and Lincoln, internationally to venues in Italy, Belgium, France and to the V&A touring exhibition in China
• hosting 43 talks and events, including the RIBA+VitrA series and the Ozolins and Grimshaw lectures
• securing a 253% increase in visitor numbers to our exhibitions and public programmes across all venues

Collections highlights included:

• enabling 4,323 researchers to access more than 14,000 items – an increase of 59% and 19% respectively
• acquiring 700 new books for the Library
• indexing more than 6,000 architecture articles from more than 140 journals and periodicals
• handling 5,340 specialist inquiries – an increase of 9%
• continuing critical work on two major long–term projects including the Complete Catalogue of Drawings by Andrea Palladio (1508–1580)
• digitising more than 30,000 images and adding more than 7,000 to RIBAPix, meaning more than 130,000 images are now available to the public
• developing plans for co–locating RIBA’s collections from five sites to one to enhance the curated a research offering at 66 Portland Place, London and to transform access onsite, offsite and online. Immediate priorities have included planning for collections moves and developing the proposition around a combined home for the collections

Awards highlights included:

• securing 450 entries for the 2023 UK Awards programme
• recognising Yasmeen Lari as the 2023 Royal Gold Medallist with a series of events and an exhibition on her extraordinary contribution to architecture and to the least advantaged communities; and awarding 12 Honorary Fellowships