Worthing is home to Britain's most beautiful new building - 'Complement to the historic town'

The Bayside development, in Brighton Road, was named the overall winner of The Royal Fine Art Commission Trust’s Building Beauty Awards 2023 on Friday night (November 10).

The stunning 15-storey apartment block – which opened in 2021 – is a mixed-tenure housing development, comprising a 170ft seafront tower, a six-storey garden square and a beachside café.

"The tower is a fully-glazed orthogonal block, set behind generous rippling balconies with slim white metal railings,” a Building Beauty Awards profile read.

“This is an impressive exercise in using local references to create an original and powerful landmark – a worthy replacement for the depressing 1960s swimming pool that previously occupied the site and which, ironically, turned its back on the sea.”

Planning permission was granted in 2017 for the £45 million Bayside apartments scheme at the former Aquarena Pool site.

Designed by Allies and Morrison for Roffey Homes, the scheme consisted of two elements – the 15-storey Bayside Vista with balcony views across the English Channel and Bayside Horizon which offer balconies or outside space.

The profile continued: “It sits literally beachside and forms an exclamation mark that counterbalances the horizontal mass of the pier.

"At the same time, it bookends the seafront terraces of Regency Worthing, harmonising well with their white stucco while steering clear of weak historicism.

"Its location at the point of transition between the Regency town and later development gives it a particular job to do: this is often the point at which close-grained townscape reaches a sputtering end, petering out into dispiriting ribbon development.

"This building mitigates that by holding out the promise of a place worth visiting.”

The judges were impressed that development – ‘viewed from the distant pier’ – ‘announces itself as a destination – not aggressively’, but as a ‘complement to the historic town’.

"At close quarters, the sinuous balconies offer visual variety and even a maritime echo, but in a disciplined way,” they added.

"Sometimes seaside buildings can be over-literal in their references, with clodhopping detailing in the shape of waves and prows. Here it is done evocatively but subtly.

"Viewed obliquely, the sea-facing elevation is wonderfully playful, but seen full-frontal from the beach it is rigorous and devoid of frippery.”

The building will now represent the UK on the international stage as it is in the running for the International Building Beauty Prize at the 2023 World Architecture Festival in Singapore later this month.