CITYMAKERS: The Power of Co-Design with Madeleine Kessler

She is currently a Royal Commission’s 1851 Built Environment Fellow, embedding design thinking in government decision-making. Over the past decade she has led a number of award-winning projects including the co-curation of the British Pavilion at the 17th Venice Architecture Biennale. Trained as an architect and engineer, Madeleine sits on the National Infrastructure Commission’s Design Group and is the Arts & Culture Expert on Design Review Panels across the UK. She is an Associate Lecturer at Central St Martin’s and the Architectural Association and previously a Visiting Professor at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology.

The lecture will be followed by a discussion, also joined by Hana Skljarszka. Hana is a sociologist and facilitator who collaborates with Nová Cvernovka, the largest creative and cultural centre in Slovakia and a 2025 SozialMarie award-winning project for social innovation. She helped co-create its strategy using participatory methods and now supports its implementation in everyday practice. Her work focuses on connecting communities with the space and helping build processes that allow both the communities and the wider system around them to grow in a sustainable way alongside Bratislava – one step at a time.

This event has already taken place.