The most important commission a city can make is a vision

By Martyn Evans 2026-09-29T06:00:00

Judging this year’s UK Design Capital of the Year award has reminded Martyn Evans that the greatest act of civic design is not designing a building at all – it is deciding what kind of city you want to become

I have spent much of my working life involved in regeneration, and one thing has become increasingly clear to me: the most valuable design commission a city can make is not necessarily a building. It’s a vision.

Reading the nominations, as one of the judges, for this year’s UK Design Capital of the Year award – Bradford, Cardiff, Plymouth and York – reinforced that conviction. The award deliberately looks beyond individual buildings towards strategic vision, leadership, placemaking, delivery, social impact and economic transformation.

That matters because cities are not collections of development sites – they are complicated organisms in which housing, streets, transport, culture, heritage, landscape, work and civic life constantly interact.

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