2025 at the Academy of Urbanism

January

Rested and ready for the year ahead, January of course hosted the biannual Members’ Social (pictured), an opportunity to come together in person with fellow urbanists down at our office in Farringdon and catch up over a drink.

Otherwise we stayed warm at home with the online Coffee Break – in which Francis Newton talked us through his lessons from Great Places – and the Urbanism Hour with Gustav Magnusson on Creating Meaningful Urban Futures.

February

February’s online programming packed a punch, with a Coffee Break on Delivering Biodiversity Gains, and an Urbanism Hour on Quantifying the Value of Place with BiGGAR Economics’ Shona Glenn and Aimilia Manolakelli. In-person, we held the second annual AoU Founder’s Lecture at Cambridge University (pictured), this time given by Jonathan Smales, titled Action Breeds Hope.

This month we also announced the recipient of the Young Urbanist Small Grants Scheme, Hal Mellen’s ‘Back to Back-to-Back’ project, and launched tickets for Congress: Healthy Urban Living in Utrecht.

March

In March we were back in Ireland for another joint conference (pictured) with the RIAI. After two years in Galway, this time the conference took place in Dublin, in partnership with the Department of Housing, Local Government & Heritage, with the theme of Balanced by Design.

Online, the Coffee Break offered an introduction to land for development, and the Urbanism Hour looked at Rebuilding Urban Complexity, with Dr Francesca Froy.

April

We welcomed a few new faces in April: two Board Directors, Siddiqa Islam and Jonathan Wilson, and our lovely maternity cover Membership Coordinator, Avantika Pathania.

The Young Urbanists held an al fresco Pub Night (pictured), the Urbanism Hour explored Urban Design as a Technical Vocation with Philip Black and Michael Martin, and we launched a call for submissions for the new Summer of Walking programme.

May

May’s in-person offering included a talk on Politics and the Built Environment, a breakfast session (pictured) launching the Rethinking Retail Parks paper with Lichfields, and a visit to the New Ground Co-housing Community in Barnet. The Urbanism Hour having taken its summer hiatus, the online slot was filled by a webinar presented by the Young Urbanists, titled Urbanism at Night: When the sun sets and the city thrives.

The Spring 2025 edition of the AoU’s e-journal, Here & Now, was also published, looking at the theme of Mobility.

June

Of course the headline in June was Congress, which took place across 3 days in Utrecht (pictured) on the theme of Healthy Urban Living. Delegates from across the globe joined to understand this theme hands-on, through an intricate programme of talks, workshops, and site visits. Here, we also launched the AoU’s 20th anniversary, whose programming will run until summer 2026.

Elsewhere in the world, a new network of members in the Gulf hosted an Evening of Urbanism in Dubai, and members in Glasgow launched a new Book Club, kicking off with David Harvey’s Rebel Cities: From the Right to the City to the Urban Revolution.

July

July kicked off with a long weekend in Belgium, in the form of the Young Urbanist Cycle Trip (pictured), which went from Brussels to Ghent, investigating the country’s cycle infrastructure and meeting with local urbanists in both cities to discuss everything from lighting to urban farming. Watch the video diary courtesy of Young Urbanist Ellen Sanders at: youtu.be/WAwDIO3jZjk?si=iRp9EGMY07xqouBh

And the Summer of Walking got off to a great start, with tours in Leith and Beckenham led by members Ross Irvine and Mehron Kirk. And we held the summer instalment of the Members’ Social, up on our rooftop looking out over London.

August

Never ones to quiet down too much over the summer, August played host to four more walking tours with themes from adaptive re-use to street markets, as well as the Young Urbanist Social in Regent’s Park.

Later in the month, another new event series was born, Authors of Urbanism, hosted in Glasgow by our friends at Collective. For the inaugural session, the group was joined by Dr May East to hear about her recent book, What If Women Designed the City?

In other literary news, in August we also published the Summer edition of Here & Now, which took its thematic inspiration, Healthy Urban Living, from Congress earlier in the year.

September

The Summer of Walking wrapped up with four more tours in September - including one inspired by the lyrics of Pet Shop Boys – while other in-person events included the Glasgow Book Club and a lecture hosted by Foster + Partners, given by Head of Design Spencer de Grey (pictured)looking at urban connections.

Online, the Urbanism Hour returned with Social Life’s Mena Ali and Simeon Shtebunaev exploring the Social Impacts of Large Scale Regenerations. We also launched the call for applications for the next cycle of the AoU’s Young Urbanist Mentoring Scheme.

October

October was the proverbial calm before the storm as we built towards November’s anniversary party. We kept it mostly online with a few member call outs and the Urbanism Hour, which was an Introduction to 21st Century Gulf Urbanism led by several members of our network in the region. In London, a sizeable group of existing and prospective Young Urbanists braved the rain for another pub night (pictured).

November

This November we celebrated 20 years of the Academy of Urbanism with an anniversary party (pictured) hosted by JTP. New and longstanding members came together for an evening both of reminiscing and of looking ahead. Poet-in-Residence Ian McMillan joined us to perform a special anniversary poem and share his memories of 20 years’ collaboration with the Academy. It was his final AoU engagement before he retires, and you can watch it back at youtu.be/379tgBguFQ4

Continuing the year’s literary theme, a first meeting of the new YU London Book Club met to discuss Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities, and the second instalment of Authors of Urbanism took place in Glasgow with Johnny Rodger, discussing his recent book The Housing Film. Later in the month, a short ScotRail jaunt away, our Scottish network held their Winter Social in Edinburgh.

The Urbanism Hour looked at Climate Innovation in the Public Sector, using Eclipse Leisure Centre as a case study.

December

We kicked off December with an incredibly popular panel event, Delivering Inclusive Urbanism, held at the British Library in partnership with the Dutch Embassy. The event built off ideas presented in Chris & Melissa Bruntlett’s book, Women Changing Cities, and expanded on the how of inclusive urbanism with Melissa herself and panelists Rezina Chowdhury, Jade Morgan, Sowmya Parthasarathy, and Geke van Dijk (pictured).

Online, meanwhile, we launched the call for nominations for the 2026 cycle of the Urbanism Awards, held the final Urbanism Hour of the year – a quiz! – and published an edition of the e-journal focusing on digital cities.