The Architects’ Journal Architecture News & Buildings
Judges unanimously awarded Owens the prize for her impactful work within her practice and beyond.
Owens’ wide-ranging work on retrofit (through commercial projects at BGY and through the domestic sector at the NRH) and her talent as a communicator and facilitator differentiated her from a strong shortlist.
‘Rachael is a self-confessed convener with incredible energy,’ said one of the judges.
Within BGY, Owens has continued to refine an interactive sustainability toolkit that signposts internal and external resources to staff, as well as a system of internal trackers that enables project architects to ensure that basic sustainability parameters are being addressed.
Source:BE-ST (Built Environment Smarter Transformation)
Rachael Owens co-chairing the International Retrofit Conference at BE-ST in Scotland in 2023
Building on her role in ACAN’s Climate Literacy group, she has organised practice-wide guest lectures on topics ranging from building performance to inclusive design to inspire her colleagues and build their confidence in addressing sustainability issues with clients. ‘Now I hear colleagues discussing embodied carbon even when they’re not talking to me!’ she says.
Using Architects Declare’s practice roadmap, Owens has devised visual ‘wheels’ to explain the practice’s sustainability achievements to date and outline next steps – important in keeping directors abreast of progress. This is part of an ongoing process to track and build capacity across the practice.
In July 2023, she took on a co-director role alongside Sara Edmonds at the National Retrofit Hub, to which she now devotes three days a week. This was made possible by BGY recruiting a new member of staff, whom Rachael is mentoring to support her role.
‘Now I hear colleagues discussing embodied carbon even when they’re not talking to me!’
As part of a small team at the NRH, Owens promotes a holistic understanding of retrofit, bringing together expertise from six thematic work groups and sharing it onwards. Her initial work has focused on developing digital logbooks, which can be used to aggregate local data and scale retrofit delivery.
Also in 2023, she served as sustainability expert on the RIBA Stirling Prize jury, contributed to a London School of Architecture think-tank on resilient neighbourhoods and community power and undertook pro bono feasibility work on community buildings for the Home Energy Action Lab. She also took part in ACAN’s Futurebuild workshops, engaging participants to use Kate Raworth’s book Doughnut Economics as a lens for material and product selection.
The judges also recognised Louisa Bowles’ crucial role in authoring and collaborating on the release of the second edition of the RICS Whole Life Carbon Assessment Method, and Loreana Padron’s extensive input into the Retrofit Academy’s Retrofit designer course.
Shortlisted
- Louisa Bowles, partner, sustainability lead at HawkinsBrown
- Cesar Herrera, sustainable design advisor at Perkins&Will
- Rachael Owens, head of sustainability at Buckley Gray Yeoman
- Loreana Padron, head of sustainability and associate director at ECD Architects
Judges
- Duncan Baker-Brown, founder, BakerBrown Studio and Climate Literacy Champion, University of Brighton
- Chris Brown, director, Climatise
- Younha Rhee, associate director, Atelier Ten
- Diba Salam, founding principal and creative director, Studio DS
