Alison joined Orms in 2025 from Bennetts Associates, where she was an Associate Director leading complex workplace, retrofit and mixed-use projects. A RIBA Chartered Architect, she has over 20 years’ experience designing and delivering exemplar, low-carbon buildings, including the UK’s largest steel–timber hybrid workplace, Timber Square for Landsec. She excels in client leadership, technical coordination, collaborative delivery and mentoring large teams, guiding projects from feasibility and planning through detailed design, procurement and construction in active site environments.
What does ultrapractical mean to you? Ultrapractical design is about more than efficiency — it’s about making informed, evidence-based choices that balance carbon, cost, and programme while striving for something richer than the purely utilitarian. At Timber Square, this meant addressing the fire and moisture challenges of mass timber construction with a lean structural approach, reducing unnecessary finishes, and celebrating the inherent qualities of each material. Supporting circularity and retrofit by celebrating every material’s unique quality and character is a principle I’m passionate about continuing to champion at Orms. For me, it’s the fusion of rigor and delight: designing robust details that perform, endure and enrich, delivering long-term value for clients by creating spaces that foster creativity, wellbeing and joy.