Project Circle | Phase 1
Live webinar (available on-demand following the live session)
1pm, AEST
Thursday, 9 July 2026
1 Formal CPD Point
1pm – Melbourne, Sydney
12:30pm – Adelaide, Darwin
11am – Perth
Overview
Project Circle outlines a new framework for design and construction, foregrounding material choices as the key question for the coming years. It moves beyond carbon counting and simplistic understandings of circularity into a deeper recognition of the value, potential and possibility of bio-based materials from regenerative local sources. The framework provides both technical and creative insights into materials and helps meaningfully extend the practice of design before and after the building, with implications for practice models, entrepreneurship, public design, policies, and places. The session will take participants through the framework, and via a set of local and global case studies which indicate alternative pathways for architecture, helping to outline a new agenda for the sector, replete with innovative and pragmatic approaches alongside fundamental reframing of what architecture can be.
NSCA 2021 Performance Criteria
PROJECT INITIATION AND CONCEPTUAL DESIGN
PC31: Be able to identify, analyse and integrate information relevant to environmental sustainability – such as energy and water consumption, resources depletion, waste, embodied carbon and carbon emissions – over the lifecycle of a project.
PC35: Be able to assess operational and embodied carbon implications of materials, components, construction systems and supply chains (including transport) to achieve net zero whole life carbon when developing design concepts. This includes integrating relevant consultant expertise and advising on the impact of chosen materials, components and systems on carbon outcomes.
DETAILED DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION DOCUMENTATION
PC39: Be able to integrate the material selection, structural and construction systems established in the conceptual design into the detailed design and documentation.
PC45: Be able to nominate and integrate quality and performance standards with regard to selected materials, finishes, fittings, components and systems, considering the impact on Country and the environment, and the whole life carbon impact of the project. This includes integrating life cycle assessments and other expertise and advice from consultants.
Learning Outcomes
At the end of this session, participants will be able to:
- Better understand the multiple impacts of material choices for both new-build and retrofit of buildings, particularly around upstream embodied emissions and ecosystem impact, as well as potential for circularity.
- Understand the potential of bio-based materials from local regenerative sources, in terms of innovation in design, construction, and ongoing adaptation of buildings.
- Understand emerging practice models for architects, in terms of shaping policy, regulation, and entrepreneurship that recognise architecture’s responsibility to work within ‘planetary boundaries’.
Speaker
Professor Dan Hill is Director of Melbourne School of Design, the graduate school in the Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning at the University of Melbourne. A designer and urbanist, Dan's previous leadership roles include the Swedish government’s innovation agency Vinnova in Stockholm, Arup in London and Sydney, Fabrica in Treviso, the Finnish Innovation Fund SITRA in Helsinki, and the UK's Future Cities Catapult and BBC in London. Dan is a Visiting Professor of Practice and Advisory Board member at UCL's Institute for Innovation and Public Practice. He was one of the inaugural Mayor of London’s Design Advocates, a Trustee of Participatory City Foundation, and a founder member of the Council on Urban Initiatives. He is on the editorial board of Future Observatory Journal, and the boards of Open Systems Lab, Collingwood Yards and Regen Melbourne. He is the author of the books 'Dark Matter & Trojan Horses: A strategic design playbook' (Strelka Press, 2012) and 'Designing missions' (Vinnova, 2022).
Price
Members: $20
Student members: FREE
Non-members: $120
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