Generator, an initiative which encourages our younger members of staff to build lasting relationships with peers across the built environment sector, was officially launched on August 1, with a thought leadership and networking event at Valentine Place.
A thoroughly enjoyable evening for all, speakers addressed the topic of Civilised Cities in a compelling and innovative way that set the bar high for future events.
Up first was WW+P’s Joshua Jones, who introduced the Generator team and their ambition to facilitate collaboration across the built environment sector and to establish project teams of the future. Early collaborative work includes London Festival of Architecture 2019, a Malawi School Competition, Internal Exhibitions and Case Study Field Trips.
Dave Probert, Structural Engineer at Elliot Wood spoke about the Marmalade Lane co-housing project in Cambridge, an exemplar for sustainable design methodologies. The site was recently visited by both Elliott Wood and WW+P on a ‘lessons learnt’ trip to understand residents’ viewpoints.
Diego Padilla Phillips, Associate Structural Engineer at WSP demonstrated how to reuse existing infrastructure to overcome constraints to deliver both efficiencies and exemplar buildings. He also introduced his WSP Design Studio, an initiative for design orientated engineers to collaborate with creative architectural studios on international competition entries. This included their collaborative entry for this year’s Clerkenwell Design Week.
Mark Beaver, Project and Programme Director at Mace detailed the importance of people centred design in the context of a civilised city. Understanding the value of health, education and social housing infrastructure as the foundations for society to prosper. Mark described how Mace have used their experience in the UK to increase Health and Safety Standards on a hotel project in Jordan. They have also recently achieved approval to reuse timber felled on one of their sites in Ethiopia as sustainable timber within the project on the same site.
Sarah Allaoui, IT and Audiovisual Consultant for Cundall, continued the people centred theme with her exploration of how to approach dementia in airports. Understanding the term people living with dementia, the anxiety airport design currently poses and how we can design to maintain independence. Sarah also introduced the emerging, collaborative thought leadership piece currently being developed with WW+P.
Chris Hildrey, Architect and Director of Hildrey Studio closed proceedings with his visionary piece ‘Proxy Address.’ A pioneering social enterprise project that looks to reduce homelessness and overcome the barriers that lead to severance in society. His system utilising dormant addresses to allow the homeless to remove stigma whilst also getting identification, access to services and the independence to build their own credit history. Approaching live trials in Lewisham, with major backing secured this is certainly one to watch with the potential to solve one of the nation’s largest problems.
Presentations were followed with a lively Q&A session and networking reception.
A Generator LinkedIn group, which hopes to keep lines of communication open for collaboration opportunities between events, will be launched soon.
The next event takes place on November 7 at 12 Valentine Place. We hope to see both familiar and new faces at the next event.
Please get in contact at ww-generator@westonwilliamson.com if you would like to take part or have any ideas for future themes.
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