Tribeca Sweeps Life Sciences & Research Clusters Awards
This summer, Tribeca was crowned “Best New Campus Development” at the prestigious Life Sciences & Research Clusters Conference & Awards, jointly hosted by Construction News and Property Week.
The recognition wasn’t just about design or scale – it was a powerful endorsement of a development model that places community, sustainability and social value at its core.
Reef + Partners, the team behind Tribeca, also took home the “Best Developer” title for their unwavering focus on sustainable urban regeneration and commitment to building meaningful place partnerships. Together, these wins mark a broader shift in how the industry is defining successful life science ecosystems: delivering value not only for anchor institutes but also for the communities around them.
“This recognition reflects our continued commitment to deliver best-in-class places for science, innovation and healthcare. When you combine a brilliant team with fantastic partners, great things happen,” said Peter Langly-Smith, Managing Director of Reef+Partners.
Winners were announced during a “spectacular” gala at the Hilton Bankside in London, celebrating the firms and projects that are reshaping the future of life science infrastructure. The annual conference convenes industry leaders to discuss cutting-edge trends in real estate, construction, and cluster development – sectors increasingly driven by collaboration, innovation and local impact.
As Construction News Editor Collin Mars put it, “The life sciences sector is buzzing at the moment – the UK is not just a world-leader in this sector but in the design and construction of the buildings that are fuelling it.”
That momentum is only sustainable, however, if developments continue to connect scientific excellence with social relevance: something Tribeca is proud to deliver on.
Recognised as London’s first and largest purpose-built life sciences campus, Tribeca sits in the beating heart of King’s Cross. With over one million square feet of future-forward laboratory, research and community space across four architecturally distinctive buildings, the campus is equally designed for world-class science and local people. From canal-side public spaces to vibrant cafés, homes and a new pedestrian bridge connecting neighbourhoods, Tribeca is as much about place identity as it is about research progress.
All of these factors made it stand out to the panel: going beyond glass and concrete to create a genuine ecosystem, anchored in its surroundings. Adjacent to London’s Knowledge Quarter and world-renowned centres like The Francis Crick Institute, UCL, the Alan Turing Institute and the British Library, Tribeca is positioned to catalyse collaboration at every level. It also shares space with some of the world’s biggest tech and life science players – Merck, Google, Meta, DeepMind – placing it firmly at the crossroads of global innovation and local integration.
What sets Tribeca apart is its team’s understanding that success doesn’t come from infrastructure alone, but from the networks, people and ideas it enables. That ethos runs through the entire development – from design choices to the partnerships that brought it to life.
Reef + Partners, honoured for their role in delivering this vision, have earned a reputation for marrying environmental performance with real social return on investment. Through close collaboration with local authorities, anchor institutions and startups alike, their developments activate science to create spaces where research, entrepreneurship and public life can all flourish together.
“The secret to creating life sciences ecosystems that accelerate research and discovery is to deliver amazing places that connect with their communities, deliver positive legacy and provide opportunities,” added Langly-Smith.
Reef + Partners have more recently capitalised on this momentum by sponsoring BuildFest UK, A Global Generation event in King’s Cross. The event brought together some of the most progressive thinkers and practitioners in nature-based construction, providing a platform for critical debate and practical workshops. The sponsorship was inspired by Reef’s innovative work at Tribeca, where sustainable construction is being redefined with the Tribeca Brick: a breakthrough material that cuts carbon emissions by 90%.
The Tribeca model is becoming a blueprint for what the next generation of life sciences clusters can look like: dense with opportunity, open to the community and deeply invested in the social fabric. In a time where the intersection of science and society matters more than ever, social value isn’t just a nice-to-have – it's a fundamental driver of long-term success. If the awards are any indication, the industry is wholly embracing that idea.
