The Team / Richard Murphy OBE, BA (Hons), Dip Arch, RIBA, FRIAS, RSA, FRSA, FRSE, MRIAI

Richard was educated at Newcastle and Edinburgh Universities where later he also taught fulltime. He founded the practice of Richard Murphy Architects in 1991 which has since won twenty-four RIBA awards, more than any other practice in Scotland. Awards range across many building types, including education, the arts, healthcare and housing, and demonstrate both the high design standards of the practice generally and also its versatility. The practice has also won many architectural competitions.

In July 2007 the Practice became incorporated as Richard Murphy Architects Limited and Richard became Managing Director. Richard is design leader in the practice for all projects and his work has ranged from domestic through to public and private housing; theatres and arts centres, buildings for education and health, two British Embassies and major city centre developments and master-planning.

Richard’s work has been extensively reviewed in the press and he himself frequently contributes to architectural journals. In addition he is an academic authority on the work of Italian Architect Carlo Scarpa. He continues to lecture widely both on Scarpa and on his own work both at home and abroad. 

Richard Murphy is a Member of the RIBA, a Fellow of the RIAS, an Academician of the Royal Scottish Academy, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and an Honorary Fellow of Napier University. In 2006 Richard was voted “Scottish Architect of the Year” by the readers of Prospect Magazine. In the Queen’s New Year’s Honours 2007, he was awarded an OBE.

Publications by Richard Murphy include:

'Carlo Scarpa and the Castelvecchio', published by Butterworths Architecture in English, and Arsenale Editrice in Italian.

'Querini Stampalia Foundation, Carlo Scarpa', published by Phaidon Press, London 1993 and by Dohosha Publishing Tokyo in Japanese.

'An Architects’ Appreciation of Charles Rennie Mackintosh' for the Mackintosh Society, published by Bellew Publishing.

Carlo Scarpa and Castelvecchio Revisited" Breakfast Mission Publishing.

He also presented a Channel 4 documentary “Carlo Scarpa” produced by Murray Grigor, first broadcast October 1996.

There have been two monographs on Richard's work: 'Of Its Time And Of Its Place - The Work Of Richard Murphy Architects', and 'Richard Murphy Architects: Ten Years of Practice'.

Exhibitions about the work of the practice include '21 Years, 21 Awards: The Work of Richard Murphy Architects' at both the RIBA in London and the RSA in Edinburgh.