Speaker biographies

MATT BELL, Strategic Communications Director, Heatherwick Studio

Matt is a director at the studio and provides strategic advice on public engagement. He is an expert in youth work, community development and arts education. For more than twenty years, he has devised and delivered engagement programmes on some of London’s biggest regeneration sites, including Euston station, Woodberry Down in Hackney, Kidbrooke Village in Greenwich, and the Cambridge Road Estate in Kingston.

He recently co-authored an award-winning national youth engagement toolkit (www.voiceopportunitypower.com) which began life as a pilot project in Somers Town. He is also an expert in social sustainability and has published eight separate studies measuring people’s happiness in new housing developments.

He currently sits on the board of Local Trust, a 15-year lottery funded programme pioneering new ways of building community across the UK. He is co-creator of a pioneering visual arts prize which inspires young creatives to champion an ecological renaissance through climate art https://bit.ly/3i9bjYC and jointly devised the award-winning Street Elite programme which uses sport and mentoring to tackle unemployment and alienation among young adults.

Before coming to working at Heatherwick Studio, he has previously held leadership roles with international NGOs, public bodies and a FTSE 100 business in the property, design and development sectors.

DR DHRUV ADAM SOOKHOO, Senior Lecturer in Architecture and Urbanism, Manchester School of Architecture

Dhruv is a chartered architect (RIBA), chartered town planner (MRTPI) and recognised university educator (FHEA), and Senior Lecturer in Architecture and Urbanism at Manchester School of Architecture.  He holds professionally-accredited degrees in architecture and planning from the School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape, Newcastle University, and where he later completed a PhD examining the social practices adopted by architects to negotiate housing quality during development management (NINE ESRC funded doctoral studentship). Dhruv was Head of Research and Practice Innovation at Metropolitan Workshop, where he led a practice-based research programme across studios in Dublin and London. This included A New Kind of Suburbia and People Powered Places, which explored innovative responses to improve experiences of existing and new suburban residents and critically examines innovative methods of community participation generate practice-orientated guidance for housing architects. His teaching and research are informed by understanding developed in practice as former Head of Design, Home Group and past Chair of the RIBA Housing Group.

AVA LYNAM, Researcher and PhD candidate, TU Berlin

Ava Lynam is a researcher within the Urban-Rural Assembly project at the China Center (CCST) and PhD candidate at international urbanism research institute Habitat Unit, both at TU Berlin. Her research explores rural-urban transformation, socio-spatial inequality, and the trans-local production of space at globally connected borderlands in China and Southeast Asia. Ava was Researcher in Residence at Metropolitan Workshop where she served as co-researcher for People Powered Places. Her research interests in co-production and participatory planning draw on her practice experience of housing projects in London and Dublin.

KATE CUNNINGHAM, Communications and Public Affairs Manager, Energy Action Scotland

Kate Cunningham is Communications & Public Affairs Manager for Energy Action Scotland, the national fuel poverty charity. Prior to joining EAS, Kate led communications and policy engagement across a range of organisations and sectors including media, government, education, health, arts and football. 

KATHARINE WHEELER, Partnerships & Project Development, The Stove Network

Katharine Wheeler is a researcher, creative leader, producer, and socially-engaged artist.  Her specialism is in the civic role of arts practice, using creativity as part of communities to inspire real change and imagine new futures for the places we live (creative placemaking). She has been part of The Stove since 2015 as it has grown from a small art collective into the internationally recognised placemaking organisation it is today. Katharine now works as Director of the creative placemaking network ‘What We Do Now’, working to build collaborative relationships and develop working frameworks that support grassroots approaches to have long-term impact for communities. She also developed a Handbook in creative placemaking and was central to The Stove’s recently published Creative Placemaking Approach.

DIARMAID LAWLOR - Associate Director (Place), Scottish Futures Trust

Biography to be added shortly…

DAN BENHAM, Director, Benham Architects

Part of Benham Architects, who have recently completed Grange Pavilion, alongside the IBI Group, Dan believes in people being central to all places we create and aims to create strong design ethos for practice, working on many key projects, with people, community and place at the heart of the process and final resolutions. As the youngest President of the Royal Society of Architects in Wales, returning again for a second term, Dan has been part of many thought-provoking exhibitions and talks that have allowed people to engage with the design community of Wales and ask key questions about the future of Welsh Architecture and what does it mean for the country of Wales. As a tutor and visiting lecturer of the Value Unit within the Master’s course in Cardiff University / Welsh School of Architecture, Dan has strong design credentials with a notions of architecture that stem from simple place making and pushing the boundaries of spatial understanding. Enveloped in these curiosities is a passion to understand what it means to build and create a sense of ‘home’ within a Welsh context that is rich in heritage, culture and tectonics. Dan recently extended this passion, presenting a paper in Prague this year, alongside the RSAW, about the Welsh Terrace and how its historic and social context, leads to design principles can be utilised for successful future housing designs.

MHAIRI MCVICAR, Professor, Welsh School of Architecture

Mhairi McVicar is a Professor in the Welsh School of Architecture (WSA), Cardiff University. She is Academic Lead of Cardiff University's Community Gateway, a platform which develops long term, mutually beneficial teaching, research and professional development partnerships in Grangetown, Cardiff, including the £2 million redevelopment of the Grange Pavilion as a community asset transfer.  Mhairi leads the 'Value' Unit in the MArch2 at WSA, annually embedding architectural education into live briefs developed with community partners and is currently leading research and teaching in partnership with Cardiff Council to facilitate community-led Place Plans in Cardiff.