The event brought together UCL alumni, partners and friends from across Shanghai’s finance, technology, health and built-environment sectors to celebrate long-standing collaborations between UCL and China and to look ahead to UCL’s bicentennial in 2026.
Matt Burney CMG, His Majesty’s Consul-General in Shanghai, in his opening remarks underscored three key messages. First, cities are not just places to live but platforms for creativity, innovation, and community—driving regeneration, infrastructure investment, and inclusive growth. Second, education is central to urban transformation, with UK universities leading research on climate resilience, digital change, and social equity while training the next generation of planners and architects. Finally, he highlighted the growing strength of UK-China collaboration in urban planning, where partnerships and people-to-people exchanges are shaping more sustainable and dynamic cities.
Speaking on behalf of UCL and the Advancement Office, Professor Lauren Andres, Pro-Vice-Provost for the Inequalities Grand Challenges programme and Director of Research at The Bartlett School of Planning, said it was a privilege to represent UCL and its community in Shanghai, a city that understands scale, ambition and the power of long-term planning.
Professor Andres offered heartfelt thanks to those who made the event possible, including Si Su, Head of Education, Department for Business and Trade, British Consulate-General Shanghai, and Roc Chen, Senior Trade and Investment Officer, Education and Skills, Department for Business and Trade, British Consulate-General Shanghai. She also thanked Dr Selina Wu, Senior Manager of Alumni & Supporter Relations at UCL, who leads the alumni engagement in Chinese Mainland, and Sky Lin, Chair of the UCL Shanghai Alumni Club, for his longstanding advocacy for UCL.
The reception was joined by UCL alumni whose careers span finance, education, banking, architecture and urban planning, with strong representation from the planning and built environment, management and policy, finance and technology, and health and life sciences. Our alumni are working across consultancies, universities and public bodies as well as companies like Microsoft, China Baowu Steel Group, East China Group, Huafu Securities, K.Land Asset Management and Luye Pharma, Ecadi. Their studies ranged from International Real Estate and Planning, Urban and City Planning and Project and Enterprise Management to Financial Technology, Financial Systems Engineering and Drug Discovery and Pharma Management, a mix that reflects the breadth of UCL and the way our graduates connect ideas to industry.
UCL and The Bartlett were honoured to be joined by special guests Bo Hongtao (Chair, RIBA China Chapter), Chun Jiang (Jiang Architects and Engineers), David Wei (HATCH Architects), Dr Juan Carlos Dall’Asta (Head of Department of Architecture, Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University), Professor Marc Aurel Schnabel (Dean of the Design School, Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University), and Xuelan Wang (Business Development Specialist, Design School, Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University).
Professor Andres welcomed the alumni community as the living link between London and Shanghai. “You are the thread that ties London to Shanghai and to cities across China,” she said. “You carry UCL into your businesses, laboratories, classrooms and communities. Some of you are established leaders, others are just starting out in your professional lives. All of you are part of an extraordinary network that opens doors, shares advice and turns ideas into action. You may have left UCL physically, but you remain part of our family.”
She then emphasised that UCL’s distinctiveness lies in how it brings people and disciplines together to address real-world challenges and to deliver impact now and in the future.
The Bartlett and the Bartlett School of Planning
Speaking during the reception, Professor Mike Raco set the evening in the context of The Bartlett, UCL’s Faculty of the Built Environment. The Bartlett brings together world leading schools and institutes that span architecture, planning, development, construction, energy and heritage, all working to build a better future. He underlined that The Bartlett is a community that connects science, design, social science, technology and policy, focused on delivering impact in cities and regions across the globe.
Within The Bartlett, the Bartlett School of Planning (BSP) is the longest established and one of the most prestigious planning schools in Europe. Founded in 1913, BSP has been home to influential figures such as Sir Patrick Abercrombie. Through their leadership and the work of colleagues, BSP contributed directly to the post Second World War reconstruction of London, from the Abercrombie plans to shaping policy and practice, while Lord Holford was responsible for the Town and Country Planning Act 1947. Professor Raco recalled Abercrombie’s international legacy, including his work on the Hong Kong Masterplan in the 1940s, a strategic planning document that set out a framework for employment, housing and infrastructure that still shapes the city today and drew on Chinese principles of balance, harmony and Feng Shui. He also highlighted the contribution of the late Sir Peter Hall, whose scholarship on New Towns and his landmark book Cities in Civilisation continues to influence planning and urban studies worldwide.
The School has a long history of welcoming students from China, many of whom go on to shape planning, policy and development practice across Chinese cities and regions, while maintaining close links to UCL and to each other as alumni.
BSP’s partnerships and research in China
Professor Raco explained that BSP’s growing portfolio of work in China illustrates The Bartlett’s global ambitions. The School is at the forefront of research into urban development and transformation and leads key collaborations in this field.
Professors Andres and Raco are currently working with Peking University on artificial intelligence, urban development and sustainability, and with Shanghai University on urban regeneration and AI technologies. Together with partners, they are examining how AI is being used to shape urban development and its potential role in the future of planning in cities.
BSP is also home to Professor Fulong Wu and his China Cities team, whose research has advanced understanding of urban governance, spatial restructuring, housing reform and social inequality in Chinese cities.
Partnerships with universities in Shanghai and across China continue to evolve. Professor Raco & Andres are in Shanghai this week to formally sign an agreement with Shanghai University that strengthens mutual work on urban regeneration and the development of liveable cities. BSP also has a memorandum of understanding with the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences. Professor Andres and Professor Raco have also very strong links at Tongji University; they gave two keynotes in a conference on AI and the future of cities during this visit.
London, Shanghai and shared urban futures
Turning to the relationship between London and Shanghai, Professor Raco reflected on why this community and these collaborations matter now.
He described London and Shanghai as cities that drive contemporary economies, acting as centres of outward-looking innovation and playing key roles within their national economies and societies. Both are enormous producers of employment, finance and radical innovation. At the same time, both face significant planning challenges, such as balancing growth with pressures on housing, infrastructure and the physical environment.
He pointed to the wider context in which both cities sit. Across the United Kingdom and Europe, there is an urgent discussion about how to connect global cities to so-called left-behind places. Within London there are large inequalities between neighbourhoods and communities. Shanghai also navigates questions of inclusion, opportunity and access as it continues to grow and transform.
There is much that each city can learn from the other. Shanghai is a global leader in its capacity to deliver large-scale infrastructure projects and oversee the regeneration of new districts. Its governance model is at the forefront of experimenting with AI technologies and data-informed decision making. London has championed new growth while maintaining its historic environment and longstanding commitments to green space and public realm.
By working together, Professor Raco argued, cities such as London and Shanghai can explore new ways of creating liveable and what are increasingly described as foundational places and economies, where basic services, social infrastructure and opportunities are accessible to everyone. Drawing on the work of urban scholar Jane Jacobs, he reminded the audience that “cities have the capability of providing something for everybody, only because and only when they are created by everybody.”
In this spirit, he underlined the role of BSP’s Chinese students and alumni as co-creators of that future, bringing their experience of both London and Chinese cities into shared research, teaching and professional practice.
UCL 200 and the Grand Challenge of Inequalities
Looking ahead to UCL 200, the University’s bicentennial in 2026, Professor Andres invited partners and alumni in Shanghai to take a prominent role. UCL 200 will be a year-long programme of exhibitions, public art, storytelling and community-led projects reflecting UCL’s founding values and global impact. Alumni are contributing through Generation UCL, which gathers memories of student life and its impact on careers and communities.
Professor Andres connected UCL 200 with her brief as Pro-Vice-Provost for Inequalities and the University’s flagship Grand Challenges programme, which cultivates interdisciplinary collaborations on pressing societal problems. Launched in September 2025, the Grand Challenge of Inequalities is a five-year programme that will design, test and scale approaches that reduce inequalities in practice at every level, from neighbourhoods and cities to national systems and global partners.
The programme examines the relationships between economic, political and cultural inequities and explores how digital and spatial dynamics shape them in different contexts. It recognises that societal change is increasingly driven by fast-evolving technologies, including quantum computing and artificial intelligence, which create opportunities for more critical and creative thinking about fairer futures.
“Our scope of action is local, national and global because place matters and people matter,” Professor Andres said. “Collaboration with our community in China is essential. Victoria Austin and I would very much like to hear your ideas on how we can work together here.”
She closed by returning to the central role of community. “The strength of UCL does not sit only in our laboratories, studios or lecture theatres. It sits in rooms like this one, where alumni, students, staff and partners meet, discuss and shape ideas about transformative change. With our partners, with our alumni and with the next generation of students who will carry this story forward, we will turn seed projects into solutions, and we will do so in the spirit of UCL 200.”
UCL expressed its gratitude to Matt Burney and the British Consulate-General team for hosting the reception, and to alumni and friends across Shanghai for their enduring commitment to the University.