Ukrainian volunteer collective Livyj Bereh wins the 2024 Royal Academy Dorfman Prize

The winner of the 2024 Royal Academy Dorfman Prize has been announced as the Ukrainian volunteer architecture collective Livyj Bereh. 

The annual £10,000 ($13,000 USD) honor, which is selected by a jury of Academicians following each shortlisted candidate’s public presentation, was given to the team over their restoration work in the conflict-torn country. Sir Lloyd Dorfman (the prize’s namesake) says it "goes beyond a simple architectural process, restoring hope to communities affected by the ongoing conflict."

Expanding its area of service after initially deploying on the left bank of the Dnipro River shortly after the war's outset in May 2022, the group has mostly focused on rebuilding schools and residential structures while researching the loss of historic structures in different regions.

Jury chairs Tom Emerson and Stephanie Macdonald of 6a architects said: "Livyj Bereh’s repair of roofs destroyed by the war in Ukraine provides homes, schools and hospitals, delivering an essential and urgent response to the survival of communities. Their use of modest black corrugated metal roofs produces an architectural act of collective care and resistance across the country, as powerful as any civic monument and documented with the unflinching eye of the greatest war art."

The other four emerging practices that joined Livyj Bereh as finalists this year were b+ (from Germany); Salima Naji (Morocco); and TEN (Switzerland and Serbia). The group joins other past winners Taller Gabriela Carrillo (2023); Wallmakers (2022); BCKJ Architects (2020); Boonserm Premthada (2019); and Iranian architect Alireza Taghaboni (2018).