Stuart joined PRP in January 2007, having previously run his own architectural practice since graduating from Dundee University in 1984. In his final thesis year he won the Dundee Civic Medal for his new Travers Theatre design and mixed use development on a prominent site in Edinburgh’s Royal Mile. He has lectured in the Dundee School of Architecture and judged student work at the Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen.
He has won a number of architectural commendations and awards, primarily for housing design, including a Saltire award for his own house in rural Angus. In 1989 he was placed first in the Regeneration of Scotland Design Awards, run jointly by the RIAS and the Scottish Development Agency, for his work on the restoration, conversion and extension of the South Church in Stirling. The competition judges described the work as ‘superb’. He was subsequently invited to address the RIAS executive committee in the South Church auditorium building where they have since held their annual meetings for a number of years.
Stuart has collaborated with several notable architectural firms in the UK and abroad. In recent years he has headed up hotel projects including the Arora Park International Hotel at Heathrow and the new Crowne Plaza Hotel in Marlow. His intuitive response to space, colour and texture has given him the opportunity to lead interior design projects including the Excel Hotel beside the exhibition centre at London’s Victoria Dock.
Currently he is leading the Cheshire Extra Care pfi project for PRP. This comprises the design and construction of five new care villages in Crewe, Winsford, Middlewich, Ellesmere Port and Handforth. He particularly enjoys the initial creative process and then following through the design concept by applying a rigorous discipline to ensure consistency in the detailing.
He has widely varying interests outside the field of architecture and was torn between a career in architecture and a career as an opera singer with Scottish Opera in his younger years. Deciding that architecture was less susceptible to the common cold Stuart still sings regularly and has made numerous appearances as a violinist with Tayside Symphony Orchestra.