Unlike typical built environment professionals, I have spent time working in public health gaining invaluable insight into the link between social determinants of health and the built environment.

This has led to a trajectory of roles demanding a system perspective on how to plan health into place and to design infrastructure to avoid disruption.

Whilst advising for the NHS Healthy New Towns programme, I was responsible for producing national guidance to influence planning policies to improve local access to infrastructure and services to shape life chances. This process was dependent on research and application of the use of nature-based solutions to establish resilience in the form of biophilia, biomimicry and circularity.

I have significant experience developing policy on protecting and enhancing biodiversity including developing the first Westminster Council’s Open Space and Biodiversity Strategy 2015 and specifically the Borough’s first chapter on health and open space.

In my most recent role as Housing Lead for the Connected Places Catapult, I was reliant on the use of system mapping to understand the siloed industry of domestic retrofit and its pathways to reach a net zero by 2050. Currently, I am researching the circular economy and its role in reducing the toxicity of future homes to prevent hospital emissions, utilising a system approach to evaluate pathways and consequences.