the critics

Joseph McCready
Joseph McCready graduated from the Unitec BLA programme with honours 10 years ago and currently works as a senior landscape architect at Beca where he has been for 5 years working on a range of projects from large roading infrastructure to subdivisions and cycleways. He has also worked at Natural Habitats, Jasmax and Auckland Council. He has a particular interest in the process of design as well as landscape in the urban realm, ecological restoration and green technologies.

 Julia Wick
Julia has several years’ experience as a landscape architect where she has been involved in a large number of projects throughout a variety of scales and stages of the design process. Her strengths lie in the field of landscape assessment and analysis along with CPTED assessment.
Julia has a particular interest and expertise in Design Planning. She has undertaken a number of Landscape, Visual Assessments and Peer Reviews for large-scale strategic infrastructure and land use projects in urban and rural landscapes across New Zealand.

Stuart Houghton
Stuart is a qualified urban designer and registered NZILA landscape architect with more than fourteen years’ experience in New Zealand and the United Kingdom. He has a breadth of experience in urban design and landscape architecture, for sites at a range of scales and for clients in both the public and private sector. His design work includes preparing urban design frameworks, structure plans, and site master plans as well as strategic and conceptual design proposals for streets and public spaces.
As an urban designer Stuart has proven experience of working collaboratively as part of multi-disciplinary teams on complex urban development, infrastructure and public realm projects. He brings to each commission an open and inquiring mind, clear strategic design thinking and robust and considered analysis of issues and opportunities.
In addition to his design expertise Stuart has strong written communication and presentation skills that have enabled him to gain considerable experience in the areas of urban and landscape planning, including strategy and policy, design guidance, urban design and landscape assessment, and presentation of expert evidence at council hearings for plan changes and resource consents. In 2014 Stuart was appointed to a term on the Auckland Urban Design Panel that provides design review to large scale, complex and high profile development projects across Auckland.
Stuart is developing a growing profile as an urban design practitioner with a particular focus and track record in the transportation field. To this end Stuart has recently completed a 16 month Certificate in Next Generation Transportation Alternatives, a multi-disciplinary online CPD programme for mid-career professionals around the world led by Gordon Price of the Cities Programme at Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, Canada. The programme is focussed on addressing some of the hard questions facing cities such as how to plan, design and implement multi-modal streets including how to prioritise competing demands for space by transport modes and seeing transformational change through highly politicised processes.
Stuart naturally bridges professional and disciplinary divides between planning and design, strategy and implementation, and public and private interests, to deliver higher quality, more liveable cities and urban places. His work has received a number of awards including most recently the NZILA Charlie Challenger Supreme Award for the Auckland Transport City East West Transport Study, as well as a visionary urban design award from the NZILA for his master’s thesis.

Juan Molina
Juan Molina is a senior architect and urban designer at CPRW Fisher. Juan is a graduate of the Escola Tècnica Superior d'Arquitectura de Barcelona and a Spanish Registered Architect,  member of the Collegi Oficial d’Arquitectes de Catalunya.  Juan was taught by luminaries, Enric Miralles and Ignasi de Solà-Morales and worked with Viaplana and Pinon on the early days of the ‘Plazas duras’ in Barcelona. He has over 20 years of experience as a practicing architect in New Zealand and Spain, projects include the master planning of Britomart with Cheshire Architects and designing a NZIA award winning projects with CPRW Fisher.

Orson Waldock
Orson Waldock is the Work Group Manager for Opus's Auckland based team of Landscape Architects and Urban Designers. Orson also works with the national team of over 20 Landscape Architects across 5 offices, assisting with coordination of resources, skills and business development opportunities across the county. Orson’s combination of design skills, project team co-ordination and project management skills make him a strong team member in the development and delivery of quality projects for clients.

John Walsh

John Walsh is the Communications Manager of the New Zealand Institute of Architects. He was a former editor of Architecture New Zealand and Houses magazines and managing editor at AGM Publishing.  A graduate of Auckland and Columbia Universities, John is the author of three books on New Zealand architecture, and editor of the catalogue for the New Zealand pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale. His next project is a book on the late Wellington architect, Gerald Melling.  

Ben Clark
Ben joined Boffa Miskell’s Auckland urban design team in early 2012 as a landscape architect and urban designer. Ben graduated from University of Auckland with a Master of Urban Design. Ben has acquired a broad range of analysis and design skills while studying, giving him an understanding of how networks and processes work from the larger macro scale down to the micro scale.
Ben has been involved in a number of landscape architecture and urban design projects since joining Boffa Miskell including masterplanning of residential and industrial areas in Auckland and Hamilton. Ben has also worked on a number of multimodal transport projects visioning how transport corridors will evolve in response to the changing demands of the city. Ben has experience in a variety of landscape design projects including planting design for streetscapes, reserves and stormwater infrastructure.

Ben’s interests in urban design lie in regional growth strategies and masterplanning particularly addressing how Auckland’s urban form will respond to a significantly growing population in the near future.