More names released for judging panel - Winter Awards 2021

Future Cities Forum is releasing further names for our all female judging panel - Winter Awards 2021.

The Leader of Westminster City Council, Cllr Rachael Robathan, will join our judging panel along with V&A's Director of Design, Estate, and Public Programme, Dr Philippa ('Pip') Simpson, architects dRMM's founding director and National Infrastructure Commission commissioner Sadie Morgan, Head of Grimshaw's London Studio Kirsten Lees, and Director at Chapman Taylor, Marcelina Zielinska

In 2010, Cllr Robathan was elected to Westminster City Council to represent the Knightsbridge and Belgravia Ward. Before becoming Leader she held the Cabinet Member portfolios for Finance, Property and Regeneration; Housing and Adults and Public Health and was Deputy Cabinet Member for both the Adult Services and Customer Services portfolios. Cllr Robathan has also sat on the Finance and Children's Policy and Scrutiny Committees and Planning Committees.

Cllr Robathan spent 20 years working in Investment Management, specialising in emerging markets. Cllr Robathan is also a Trustee of The Westminster Almhouses Foundation, a charity which provides sheltered housing to over 60s in the city and a board member for The National Lottery Community Fund. Her portfolio includes: City For All (Corporate Strategy); Governance; Communications; Policy; Climate Emergency; Strategic Partnerships and HR.

Dr Philippa Simpson took up her post at the V&A in December 2018 and leads the Design Studio, the Estate including all Capital Projects, and the Public Programme including exhibitions. She studied at the Courtauld Institute of Art and the University of Edinburgh, where she gained her BA Hons and MSc Res in History of Art.

Having worked for a short time in the commercial art sector, she moved into museums as a curator at Tate, working on a range of international exhibitions and gallery projects while completing her PhD at the Courtauld on display culture and the genesis of the public gallery. She then moved to Royal Museums Greenwich to establish and manage an international touring exhibition programme. In 2014 Philippa joined the V&A to deliver a number of capital projects, including the Exhibition Road Quarter.

Sadie Morgan is a founding director of Stirling Prize winning architecture practice dRMM, alongside Alex de Rijke and Philip Marsh. As a design champion Sadie undertakes advisory roles including chairing the Independent Design Panel for High Speed Two and as a commissioner for the National Infrastructure Commission (NIC). She has been instrumental in setting up the NIC’s Design Group which places design at the heart of major infrastructure projects.

In 2019, Sadie was appointed as a board member of the UK government’s housing accelerator – Homes England. She recently founded the Quality of Life Foundation – an independent body aimed at raising wellbeing through improvement of the built environment. Sadie lectures internationally on dRMM and the importance of infrastructure. In 2013 she became the youngest president of the Architectural Association. In 2016 she received an honorary doctorate from London South Bank University and was appointed professor at the University of Westminster. In 2021, Sadie was awarded the visiting Sir Arthur Marshall Professorship in Sustainable Urban Design at Jesus College, Cambridge University. In 2017, Sadie became a Mayor’s design advocate for the Greater London Authority. In the New Year’s Honours 2020 she was awarded an OBE for services to design advocacy in the built environment.

Kirsten Lees is Managing Partner of Grimshaw's London studio, overseeing the development of the studio as it continues to grow. She is a highly experienced architect with over 25 years' experience in architecture, strategic planning, urban design and regeneration in sensitive environments within the arts, sports and master planning sectors. She brings insight and creativity to the development of strategic projects, and she demonstrates strong conceptual judgment when integrating buildings into sensitive settings, both urban and rural.

Genuine innovation and architectural distinction distinguish Kirsten's projects, which are founded on the insightful translation of client and stakeholder objectives. Her work has been acknowledged for its subtle response to place, the pre-eminence of the cultural agenda and its unique expressive and material qualities. She is currently developing the Koc Contemporary Art Museum in Istanbul and a new grandstand for Curragh Racecourse.

Director at Chapman Taylor, Marcelina Zielinska, joined the firm in 2007 and was promoted to Director in 2017. Having worked initially on the successful delivery of St, David's 2 in Cardiff, she then moved to the UK concept design team to focus on the early design stages of major projects. She has a love for urban environments and a keen interest in the master planning and design of complex mixed-use developments as catalysts for urban regeneration.

In a recent insight paper for her firm, Marcelina argues that good urban design, particularly in an era of rapid and profound commercial and societal changes, must be underpinned by a thorough understanding of the people who will use, live, work, shop and enjoy the spaces we create, particularly if we are to reverse the phenomenon of identikit high streets and commercial centres that have plagued the UK and much of the western world in recent decades.

Last week, Future Cities Forum announced that Historic England's Regional Director - Midlands, Louise Brennan, Kier Group's Head of Sustainability, Jo Gilroy, Senior Director - asset management at CBRE, Abi Labbett, Partner at architects Wright & Wright Naila Yousuf, and Associate Director at SPPARC Georgia Katsaouni, would also join the judging panel.