PechaKucha on Housing: Learnings from the Byera Hadley Travelling Scholarship in partnership with the State Library of New South Wales
Catch up on an evening of global housing insights and fast-paced storytelling—recorded live on 30 April 2025 at the State Library Auditorium.
Ten recipients of the Byera Hadley Travelling Scholarship (BHTS) shared fast-paced presentations on international housing research, highlighting the scholarship’s continued role—75 years on—in supporting architects, graduates and students to explore and address the built environment’s most pressing challenges.
Presented in the engaging PechaKucha format—20 slides per speaker, delivered in just 6 minutes and 40 seconds—each BHTS scholar shared insights from around the globe on how innovative approaches to housing can inform local solutions for affordability, sustainability, and community wellbeing.
Event Details
Date & Time: Wednesday, 30 April 2025
Location: State Library of NSW, Metcalfe Auditorium & Glasshouse
Watch Now
This event was presented as part of the State Library’s 2025 Year of Architecture program and was a fringe event to the Australian Institute of Architects’ National Conference. It also marked the beginning of celebrations for the 75th anniversary of the Byera Hadley Travelling Scholarship, funded by the estate of the distinguished educator and NSW architect, Byera Hadley (1872–1937). In the past decade alone, the NSW Architects Registration Board has awarded more than $1 million to 84 scholars for research addressing urgent challenges in housing, urban design and architectural practice.
SPEAKER BIOS
Featured speakers
The evening featured presentations by ten BHTS scholars, each exploring diverse topics including affordable housing models, community-led design, mixed-use development, ageing, advocacy and urban wellbeing. The Board extends its sincere thanks to the speakers for their insight, clarity and generosity in sharing their research with the public and the profession.
Professor Helen Lochhead AO is an architect and urbanist who has combined academic and advisory roles with practice, holding significant leadership roles. Her career has focused on complex urban projects ranging from city improvements to major urban regeneration in Australia and internationally. Helen’s BHTS research evaluated historic and new transit-oriented planned communities across the US to uncover lessons for modern development.
Sophie Lanigan is a designer and researcher pursuing a PhD at the University of Cambridge on coastal urban design and opportunities to remediate coastal erosion and bio-diversity loss. Her BHTS research studied Athens’ polykatoikia as a model for Sydney’s housing crisis, exploring its economic, historical, and urban implications for increasing density and affordability.
Dr Hugo Moline is an architect, public artist, researcher, co-director of MAPA collaborative spatial practice, and lecturer in architecture at the University of Newcastle. His BHTS research involved working with, and learning from, communities in Thailand, Venezuela, the US and Mexico who were collaborating with architects to improve informal, insecure tenure housing.
Victoria King is a designer at Hill Thalis A+UP who is drawn to projects that embed an ethics of care for the communities that inhabit them. Her BHTS research focused on the regeneration of historic mixed-use buildings in Southeast Asia and Northwestern Europe as an alternative to developer-led demolition and reconstruction.
Guy Luscombe is an architect who has spent most of his architectural career asking questions of the built environment to make it better for an increasingly older population. His BHTS research, “The NANA Project – New Architecture for the New Aged,” studied innovative residential accommodation for older people in Europe.
Georgina Blix is an architect and founder of Blix Architects, with expertise in urban design, education and residential apartment design. Her BHTS research investigated mixed-use communities and housing worldwide to identify strategies for designing for and measuring wellbeing in architecture.
Alexander Jones is an affordable and social housing practitioner working across government and private practice to advocate for better housing outcomes. His BHTS research analysed European case studies of social housing refurbishment over wholesale demolition/rebuild to propose an alternative future for Matavai Tower at the Waterloo Estate.
Alexandra McRobert is an architect who has worked across public, private and academic sectors to deliver well designed, equitable housing, which she continues in her role as Director of Design for the Queensland Department of Housing. Her BHTS research investigated manufactured housing models that integrate ownership structures, land policies, and community networks.
Hannah Bolitho is an architect and urban designer who is Practice and Strategy Lead at the UNSW Cities Institute, undertaking research around urban governance for the health and wellbeing of all Australians. Her BHTS research studied collective advocacy approaches in European contexts to explore how architects can better engage with the political decision-making processes that shape cities.
Associate Professor Michael Zanardo is an architect, urban designer and director of Studio Zanardo, specialising in the design of public and affordable housing. He combines practice with research and teaching at UNSW. His BHTS research explored affordable housing strategies in Amsterdam compared with Sydney, identifying transferable lessons for new projects.
About the Partnerships
This event launched a year-long collaboration between the NSW Architects Registration Board and the State Library of New South Wales. Through a program of public events, exhibitions and digital content, the partnership will highlight the role of architecture in improving lives and shaping the future of our cities and communities.
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