Meet the 2021 Judging Panel
Louise Clarke - Chair of Judging Panel
Head of Sustainable Places – Berkeley Group
Louise is Head of Sustainable Places at the Berkeley Group and is responsible for setting and implementing the group’s strategy to create sustainable places. This includes focusing on key commitments for the business on climate change adaptation, social sustainability and sustainable procurement. Louise has specialised in sustainability throughout her career and has a keen interest in placemaking which stemmed from her masters in Urban Design.
Louise is a Non-Executive Director of Construction Industry Council (CIC), sits on the Green Construction Board and chairs the CIC 2050 Group, a group of young professionals within the construction industry.
Caroline Ford
Principal Ecologist - Atkins (member of the SNC Lavalin group)
Caroline is a Principal Ecologist at Atkins (member of the SNC Lavalin group) and Chartered Ecologist (CIEEM) with over nine years’ experience in ecological consultancy. She manages ecological input for a range of projects including road, rail, aviation and flood alleviation schemes, as well as for small- and large-scale residential and commercial developments in the UK. Caroline is currently involved in the design of large-scale road infrastructure and the preparation of detailed mitigation and compensation strategies to ensure legal compliance and enable a positive outcome for development, biodiversity and local communities. She regularly undertakes Ecological Impact Assessment, Habitat Regulations Assessment, and protected species surveys to inform the procurement of European Protected Species (EPS) mitigation licences for projects that involve impacts to protected species including bats and hazel dormice, and provides ecology input to BREEAM. Caroline is an active volunteer and key member within her local conservation groups including Surrey Dormouse Group (Site Leader), Surrey Bat Group (Surveyor) and London Bat Group (former Secretary). She is a Volunteer Bat Roost Visitor for Natural England and a Registered Bat Carer with the Bat Conservation Trust.
Philip Askew
Dr Phil Askew, Director of Landscape & Placemaking at Peabody
Phil is currently leading on Thamesmead, London’s New Town and one of London’s largest regeneration and development projects. He has a background in Urban Design, Landscape Architecture and Horticulture and leading on major regeneration and green infrastructure projects. Prior to his current role he led the design and delivery of the London 2012 Olympic Park at the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) and its transformation into the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, the UKs largest new urban park in over a century. At Peabody he is leading a green infrastructure and landscape led approach to Thamesmead called Living in the Landscape making the most of its unique green and blue assets. This will ensure Thamesmead's landscape underpins the regeneration and development taking place and responds to a post-covid world and the climate crisis.
Sam Bower
Ecology & Arboriculture Lead Technical Specialist - Balfour Beatty
Sam has been working in the nature conservation sector for the last 18 years. Initially specialising in practical woodland management, conservation arboriculture and habitat management he moved into consultancy in 2012. Sam has been with Balfour Beatty since 2013 providing ecological and arboricultural support on numerous large scale infrastructure projects. In 2018, Sam was the recipient of the CLA Trophy for outstanding service to Forestry and Land Management in Kent.
Dr Martina Girvan
Technical Director - Arcadis
Martina is a Technical Director of Ecology and Arboriculture with Arcadis. She has a background in terrestrial biodiversity and ecosystem function and joined consultancy following a career in academia, with a short time spent in local government as the Greater Manchester BAP officer. In addition to managing a team of ecologists and the arboricultural business at Arcadis she undertakes major impact assessments for a wide range of national and international developments. She is a Chartership assessor with CIEEM (the ecology disciplines professional body) and regularly contributes to best practice guidance. The integration of biodiversity and society is a lifelong passion, she is currently developing the Arcadis natural capital approach in the UK.
Gary Grant
Director of the Green Infrastructure Consultancy
Gary is a Chartered Environmentalist and Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Ecology and Environmental Management. Formerly a Director at AECOM Design + Planning, he is now also a thesis tutor at Bartlett Faculty of Built Environment, UCL. He has worked on many planning and design projects, including the London 2012 Olympic and Legacy planning application, Olympic Park Biodiversity Action Plan and QEOP Management Plan, The International Quarter, Stratford, Elephant Park, south London, Education City, Qatar and the Wild Bloomsbury project for UCL. He was lead author of the Swansea City Centre Green Infrastructure Strategy and continues to work on green roof and green wall design and other urban greening initiatives. He is author of Green Roofs and Facades (BRE Press 2006), Ecosystem Services Come to Town: Greening Cities by Working with Nature (Blackwell-Wiley 2012), The Water Sensitive City (Wiley 2016), and was a contributor to Climate Design: Design and Planning for the Age of Climate Change (ORO Editions 2010) and Nature Based Strategies for Urban and Building Sustainability (Elsevier 2018).
Rosie Whicheloe
Principal Landscape Ecologist – London Wildlife Trust
Rosie’s has over ten years’ experience working in landscape planning green infrastructure design and ecological assessment. She provides strategic ecological advice to design teams to ensure new development maximises their value to wildlife and people – the vision: to create a London a live with Nature. Current projects include working with Old Oak Common and Park Royal Development Corporation, Redrow Homes and Berkeley Homes.
Jo Gilroy
Group Head of Sustainability & Environment
Jo is a Sustainability Professional specialised in working in the corporate sector. She is passionate about the potential for business to ‘do well by doing good’. In her former role as Head of Sustainability for the Bunzl Group, she created and led their Sustainable Future Programme. She worked closely with government and key customers in the hospitality and retail sectors to address ocean pollution from single use plastics. Today she is Head of Sustainability & Environment for Kier Group, responsible for the group’s strategic direction on ESG and for leading Kier new sustainable framework, ‘Building for a Sustainable World’. Jo has an international background having worked for SAB Miller in India, IKEA in Sweden, and the mining sector in Australia and New Zealand. In recognition of her work within the corporate sector she won the Business Green Sustainability Executive award in 2017 and the Rising Star award 2016 at the Packaging Industry Awards.
Hannah Bilston
Associate Ecologist – WSP
Hannah has been an ecological consultant for over 12 years and is currently an Associate Ecologist at WSP. She specialises in protected species and in particular bats. Hannah has particular interests in how provisions for wildlife can be designed into new developments. Wildlife installations she has been involved with range from green roofs with water features in very urban environments to bat barns, ponds and meadow creation in more rural locations.
Tony Williams
Principal Landscape Architect at Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII).
Tony is a full professional member of the Irish Landscape Institute (ILI) has been on the council of the ILI since 2005. He held the position of Hon. Secretary of ILI from 2008 to 2011 and President from 2013 to 2016. He is current Hon, Secretary. He has been the Irish delegate for the International Federation of Landscape Architects (IFLA) from 2007 to 2016 and has been on the executive council of IFLA Europe since 2011 first as Vice President Education until 2015 and on the Executive Council of IFLA World as President of IFLA Europe from 2015 to 2019. He is a member of the ICOMOS Ireland National Scientific Committee on Cultural Landscapes and World heritage Reflective Working Group. He is involved in a number of IFLA, ICOMOS and ILI initiatives and in particular as European Voting Member for the Climate Change Working Group and working groups on Blue Green Infrastructure (BGI) / Nature Based Solutions (NBS)
John Day
RSPB - Urban Advisor
John is Urban Adviser for RSPB. His work involves supporting and advising colleagues within the RSPB, as well as externally advising and working with architects, landscape architects, green space managers and developers to promote and encourage delivery of a multi-functional built environment for people and wildlife.
Helen Denham
Sustainability Manager - Sir Robert McAlpine
Helen is a Chartered Environmentalist (CEnv) with over 37 years’ combined practical wildlife conservation management, technical sustainability and environmental management experience in the United Kingdom and international countries including the Bahamas and Guyana. Currently, at a 400£million retail, hotel and residential project in Woking, and Sir Robert McAlpine Biodiversity Champion advising projects on wildlife related issues from legal compliance, ecological mitigation, biodiversity enhancement benefits and ecosystem services.
Experience of working in the Forestry Commission, Cumbria Wildlife Trust and for clients from government organisations, Natural England, international funding agencies such as Inter-American Development Bank, non-government organisations (NGOs), stakeholders and community groups in this and preceding employment.
Andrew Fisher
Associate Director - Technical, Countryside Properties