Smashing the glass ceiling: Every top gong in architecture now held by women

If anyone can dismantle a glass ceiling, it should be an architect. And now, in what’s being billed as a historic breakpoint in Australian architecture, every senior academic, membership and regulatory role of architecture in both in NSW and nationally has been taken by a woman.

It won’t be long either till we see the impact of that change on the character of our built environment too, say the women at the top.

“Women in the profession are typically more highly qualified than their male counterparts as they usually have to work harder and study harder to get up the ladder,” said the NSW president of the Australian Institute of Architects Kathlyn Loseby. “So arguably, they bring a broader knowledge base to their work.

“In addition, in the top roles, they perhaps define and direct the buildings of the future with their maternal instinct to nurture and create a better world for the next generation.”

All 18 of Australia’s top positions in architecture – including the National President of the Australian Institute of Architects, the President of the Architects Accreditation Council of Australia, the NSW Government Architect, the Dean of Architecture at the University of NSW and the president of the NSW Architects Registration Board – are now held by women.

And with more women joining the profession all the time, that could be only the beginning.

“I think it’s a great thing,” said Deborah Dearing, president of the NSW Architects Registration Board and Greater Sydney Commissioner, District Commissioner. “I’m not really surprised it’s taken so long to get here because it was once a very male-dominated profession.

“When I graduated in architecture in the 1970s or 1980s, women only made up five to 10 per cent of the students, and I became the only woman architect in the practice I went to. Now, the proportion of women has grown significantly to the point where they make up around 50 per cent of practising architects.”

Diversity in the profession is vital for the best possible outcomes for our cities and towns, and to reflect the diversity in the population architects serve, believes Abbie Galvin who, in December, will become the first female NSW Government Architect in its 200-year history.

“With more women, there’ll be a greater breadth of view and approach and potentially an opportunity for a greater level of collaboration,” she said. “I don’t think that’s an inherent difference between men and women, but sometimes through cultural progression, men tend to have a greater level of confidence and self-belief.

“How they project themselves then means sometimes they can shut down a conversation and collaboration earlier than maybe others would, so a decision is taken more quickly than it necessarily needs to have been.”

The women came together for a lunch at the NSW Institute of Architects in Sydney to mark the occasion on Thursday, celebrating their success in smashing the glass ceiling. Most were stunned by what, en masse, they’ve achieved.

“It’s remarkable that we’re now in all these senior positions,” said Catherine Townsend, president of the Architects Accreditation Council of Australia. “I think there’s now a real appetite in the profession for change.

“You’ve had a group of people who’ve been sitting at the table but who haven’t had a voice but have spent a lot of time listening and absorbing and working out better and more robust ways of doing things. Now there’s an opportunity for those voices and arguments and different positions to be heard.”

National Australian Institute of Architects president Professor Helen Lochhead is one of a number of women to hold the post but will be handing over to another woman, Alice Hampson, as her successor. It will be the first time there’s been a succession of three women in the top AIA post.

She is also the first female dean of the Faculty of the Built Environment at the University of New South Wales.

In comments on the gender issue, Professor Lochhead, who was earlier this year awarded the Institute’s 2019 Paula Whitman Leadership in Gender Equity Prize for her contribution to the advancement of gender equity in architecture, says that to face the challenges in today’s building industry, all talent needs to be harnessed.

“And that means women and men,” she said. “In the long run, this will make for more resilient organisations and a better, more inclusive built environment.”

This story has been updated to clarify the succession of women who have held the post of National Australian Institute of Architects president.