Communities in action

Sadie Morgan

Co-founding Director of dRMM

Sadie Morgan OBE is a co-founding director of dRMM, a RIBA Stirling Prize-winning architecture studio.

Championing design for over two decades, Sadie is involved in several advisory roles including chairing the Design Panel for High Speed Two (HS2) and acting as 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.

Sadie was made board member of the UK government’s housing accelerator, Homes England, in 2019, followed by a commissioner role on the Food, Farming and Countryside Commission in 2020. In 2021, she became a member of the Net Zero Building’s council. 

Sadie lectures internationally about her practice and the role of design in infrastructure and large-scale development. In 2013, she became the youngest president of the Architectural Association, followed by an honorary doctorate from London South Bank University and professorship at the University of Westminster in 2016. In 2021, she 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 (GLA) and was named ‘New Londoner of the Year’ by New London Architecture (NLA). She has won the ‘Female Architectural Leader of the Year’ BD award and an ‘AJ100 Contribution to the Profession’ award. In 2020, she was awarded an OBE for services to design advocacy. Most recently, Sadie established the Quality of Life Foundation – an independent body prioritising wellbeing in the built environment.

Claudia Hernández Fernández

General Director of Coordination of Policies and Environmental Culture, Mexico City

She is a biologist by the Facultad de Ciencias, UNAM, and Master in Public Management for Good Administration by the EAP-GCDMX. Claudia is member of the Academia Nacional de Educación Ambiental and member of Cohort 18 of the Program of Advanced Studies in Sustainable Development and Environment by the Colegio de México (LEAD-Mexico).

She has extensive experience in research, consulting and project coordination. She has worked within the academic (UNAM), public (Government of Mexico City) and private (CEGAM SC) sectors.

As a biologist and amateur photographer, Claudia has directed her professional development and personal commitment towards environmental education and research. Since January 2019, she has been working at the Mexico City Ministry of the Environment and she is currently the General Director of Coordination of Policies and Environmental Culture.

Alvaro García Resta

Secretary of Urban Development, City of Buenos Aires

Urban planner and architect (University of Palermo), leader for innovation in sustainable urban development (School of Design, University of Harvard), permanent member of the Jury of the School of Architecture (University of Illinois) and visitor fellow of the Latin American Observatory (The New School).

From 2015 to 2019 he served as Undersecretary of Projects in the Ministry of Urban Development and Transportation. Previously, he was coordinator of Urban Innovation Projects in the Ministry of Economic Development and Chief of Staff of the General Directorate of Healthy Mobility of the Subsecretariat of Transportation.

In the academic field, Alvaro has acted as director and teacher of programs and postgraduate courses at the University of Buenos Aires, the University of Palermo and the Buenos Aires Technological Institute. He is currently the Director of the postgraduate program in Urban Anthropological Design of the Faculty of Architecture, Design and Urbanism of the University of Buenos Aires; of the Executive Program in Urban Anthropological Design of the University of Palermo, of the Diploma in Urban Anthropology of the Faculty of Architecture and Design of the University Argentinian of the Enterprise and Adjunct Professor in charge of Urban Project at the Solsona Ledesma Chair of the last Level of vertical matter Architecture of the University of Buenos Aires.

In parallel to his role as a public official, he is Director of the Architecture Update Program of the Central Society of Architects Project and Director of Postgraduate Studies in Anthropological Urban Design at the Faculty of Architecture, Design and Urbanism of the University of Buenos Aires.

He is married and has two children.

Philip Glanville

Mayor of Hackney & Exec. Member Transport & Environment, London Councils

Mayor Philip Glanville is Chair of London Councils’ Transport & Environment Committee, and was elected Mayor of Hackney in September 2016, becoming the borough’s second directly elected Mayor. Previously a councillor in Hoxton West for 10 years, Philip spent 3 years as Cabinet Member for Housing before becoming Deputy Mayor in 2016, and then Mayor in September of that year.