Structural Concrete competition winners 2026
The Concrete Centre’s annual student Structural Concrete competition, in partnership with CARES, has joint winners from University of East London and Queens University, Belfast. The team from University of East London was Harry Dean, Bishow Simkhada, Siva Prasad Goud Lagusani and Samuel Mensah. The team from Queens University Belfast was Leah McCarter, Eimer Watson, Ross Clarke and Cormac Neeson.
The 2026 project is a new residential building with a private leisure development and basement car parking in the centre of a large UK town.
The structure is to provide four levels of accommodation, a gym at ground floor and underground car parking.
The client, a property developer, has commissioned an initial structural design for the development, to be known as Portland House, from a firm of consulting engineers. Entrants must respond as though they are the structural engineer responsible within the consultant’s team.
This year, The Concrete Centre held a virtual prize giving awards ceremony via webinar, which took place on Thursday 20 August 2023, where the winners were announced to all delegates. The online event celebrated the winner’s highlights and achievements along with their fellow entrants and the judges.
The 2026 competition attracted entries from across UK schools of engineering and three prizes were awarded.
- Joint first prize - Leah McCarter, Eimer Watson, Ross Clarke and Cormac Neeson from Queens University, Belfast.
- Joint first prize - Harry Dean, Bishow Simkhada, Siva Prasad Goud Lagusani and Samuel Mensah from the University of East London.
- Sustainability Award - Riku Gega from the University of Leeds.
Jenny Burridge, judge and Head of Education and Training at The Concrete Centre said “This year’s project was a residential building with underground car parking. The judges were impressed with the work that had gone into all the entries we had and with the structural understanding shown by the students.”
The team from Queen’s University, Belfast impressed the judges with their very high standard submission that included two good options for the structure, covering both precast and in situ options. It was a high quality, clear submission with proper referencing.
They chose the precast scheme for their proposed solution with a reinforced concrete transfer slab at ground floor accommodate the parking layout below. They had a good set of hand calculations and excellent drawings.
The team from the University of East London provided an equally good entry to the competition. Their submission was clear and well-presented and gave options for a reinforced concrete scheme and a post-tensioned scheme. They also had a transfer structure at ground floor to accommodate the car parking layout below.
Riku Gega from the University of Leeds won the sustainability report award for a clear, concise appreciation of the issues. He also proposed very reasonable modifications to the brief to allow material efficiencies to be realised.
The prize-winners will be presented with their certificates at the Concrete Centre’s autumn seminar on Thursday 19thNovember at the Institution of Structural Engineers headquarters at Bastwick Street in London.
The brief for the next competition “Structural Concrete 2027” is being launched on 1st September 2026 and is to design a new hexagonal laboratory building. More information can be found at http://www.concretecentre.com/competition