It wouldn’t be PlanExpo Green without the Opus Architecture & Construction awards, Ireland’s premier architecture and production kudos. Opus celebrates the best in design excellence, architectural merit and build quality.

OPUS Aims & Objectives

The OPUS Architecture & Construction Awards were devised by the organisers of Plan Expo (Expo Events) to reflect and reinforce the symbiotic relationship between design and construction. They have continuously evolved since the inaugural Awards in 2000, all the time striving to strengthen the inclusiveness of the key disciplines within the construction process. This is also reflected in the Panel of Assessors which includes architects, CIF nominees, a structural engineer, and a building services engineer.

Judging Criteria & Site Visits

The Awards concept is based on a holistic approach devised to promote architectural design and build quality that rises above pure utility to combine all that is practical and necessary within a building that is meaningful, humane and beautiful. It also acknowledges excellence in the construction process that combines management and teamwork with workmanship, ingenuity, creativity and performance against programme. The site visit to the selected finalists is a critical element in determining how well this objective has been achieved.

OPUS Awards – Panel of Assessors

Ciaran O’Connor, FRIAI

BA graduate of DIT, Ciaran worked in Germany and Canada before joining the Office of Public Works where he is now Assistant Principal Architect. In addition to various RIAI – including the RIAI Silver Medal for Restoration – AAI and CIF annual awards for new buildings, he has received three All-Ireland Landscape Awards, the Ford Foundation Conservation Award, the Europa Nostra Medal and the European Union Prize for Cultural Heritage. He has also published a number of works and is co-author of Space for Play; Public Works 1831 – 1987; Ireland Explored; and the Irish Specifiers Timber Guide.

Noel Dowley, FRIAI

A graduate of UCD, Fullbright Scholarship, Noel studied for his M.Arch under Louis Kahn at the University of
Pennsylvania. His work has been widely published in Irish and foreign reviews and he is the recipient of RIAI and AAI annual awards. He is in private practice and teaching since 1963.

Roger Dunwoody

Formerly Managing Director of Dunwoody & Dobson, Roger has been involved in the construction industry for 47 years. The distinguished Dunwoody & Dobson is over 100 years in business and is now under the direction of the fourth generation of the Dunwoody family. It has a particularly fine reputation in restoration and heritage contracts but this prestige work is balanced by new build in industrial and commercial projects. Roger has served on the Executive of the Construction Industry Federation (CIF) and as President of the Master Builders Contractors Association (MBCA). As Chairman of the CIF Manpower and Apprenticeship Committee he has pursued his interest in apprenticeship training and the promotion of advanced construction-related skills.

Pearse Sutton

Pearse Sutton is Managing Director and co-founder of O’Connor Sutton Cronin Consulting Engineers. He qualified from Bolton Street in 1981 and spent six years in Canada before his return to Ireland. O’Connor Sutton Cronin was established in 1988 and specialises in structural/civil, transportation and environmental engineering. It has been responsible for many prestigious structural developments, both in the public and private sector. It has offices in Dublin, Galway, Belfast and London.

David Corrigan

David Corrigan, Managing Director, Axis Engineering is a Chartered Building Services Engineer with over 30 years experience in the construction industry. During his career he was a Director of Varmings and Managing Director of Homan O’Brien Associates. He then set up his own M&E consulting engineering practice, Axis Engineering, a professional practice with a very strong focus on sustainable solutions to building services design and specification.

Michael Allen, C.Eng

Michael Allen graduated as a Mechanical Engineer from Bolton Street College of Technology and started work as a graduate engineer in Arklow with Nitrigin Eireann Teoranta in the mid-1960s. He held various engineering and project management positions, including Project & Engineering Manager for the construction of the Marino Point project for NET in Cork. He subsequently worked for a number of years in Australia as a pproject manager for a large construction company (John Holland Group). On returning to Ireland in 1984 he joined Penn Chemicals in Cork as Engineering Manager before starting up Allen & Smyth Constructions in 1986. He has been involved in the CIF over the last 20 years and served on the Executive Council, the Audit and Organisation Committee, and as President of the Master Builders & Contractors Association.

To see the 2009 winners please click here

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OPUS Awards Entry Form now available for download here

Submissions should be A4 format within a protective folder and hand-delivered or posted to Pat Lehane, Pressline Ltd, Carraig Court, George’s Avenue, Blackrock, Co Dublin. Submissions to arrive no later than Friday 10 September 2010. Email submissions will not be accepted.