Our Team
Meet the UCL Urban Laboratory team, including co-directors, academic staff, researchers and professional services.
UCL Urban Laboratory Director
Professor Catalina Ortiz
Prof Catalina Ortiz began her tenure as Director of UCL Urban Laboratory in June 2024. She joined UCL in 2015 and is Professor of Critical Urban Pedagogy in The Bartlett Development Planning Unit (DPU). She helped to develop the Global Urbanism MASc programme, for which she is a teaching contributor, and has been a member of Urban Lab’s Steering Committee since 2021. An urbanist who is passionate about spatial justice, her research uses decolonial and critical urban theory through knowledge co-production methodologies to study the politics of space production to foster more just cities and the recognition of multiple urban knowledges. Her work revolves around critical urban pedagogies, planning for equality, and southern urbanisms. As an educator, she is committed to an ethics of care and an engaged scholarship to trigger radical spatial imagination for a negotiated co-production of space.
Go straight to: Core Team / Co-Directors / Steering Committee / Professional Services
Core Urban Lab Team
- Prof Nishat Awan, Director of Research and Professor of Architecture & Visual Culture
- Dr Kara Blackmore, Curator – UCL Urban Room
- Prof Clare Melhuish, Professorial Research Fellow in Anthropology of Built Environments
- Sophie Mepham, Centre Manager
- Dr Njogu Morgan, Lecturer, Global Urbanism MASc
- Dr Joe Penny, Associate Professor and Programme Director, Global Urbanism MASc
Urban Lab Co-Directors
- Pushpa Arabindoo, Associate Professor of Geography and Urban Design
- Matthew Beaumont, Professor of Nineteenth-Century Literature
- Ellie Cosgrave, Lecturer in Urban Innovation and Co-Director of UCL Urban Innovation and Policy Laboratory
- Andrew Harris, Senior Lecturer in Geography and Urban Studies
- Jennifer Robinson, Chair of Human Geography
Urban Lab Steering Committee
- Yasminah Beebeejaun, Senior Lecturer in Urban Planning
- Ben Campkin, Professor of Urbanism and Urban History
- Joseph Cook, UCL Citizen Science Academy Lead
- Ava Fatah gen. Schieck, Professor of Media Architecture and Urban Digital Interaction
- Kalliopi Fouseki, Professor of Sustainable Heritage Management
- Mark Frost, Associate Professor of Public History
- Haidy Geismar, Professor of Anthropology
- Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Associate Professor in Sociology
- Barbara Lipietz, Professor of Urban Development Planning
- Anna Maguire, Lecturer in Public History
- Gabriele Manoli, Lecturer in Environmental Engineering
- James O’Leary, Associate Professor in Architecture
- Susan Moore, Professor of Urban Studies and Planning
- Gabriel Moshenska, Associate Professor in Archaeology
- Michał Murawski, Assistant Professor in Critical Area Studies
- Florian Mussgnug, Professor of Comparative Literature and Italian Studies
- Kieren Reed, Professor of Fine Art
- Katherine Saunders-Hastings, Lecturer in Latin American Studies
- Rafael Schacter, Associate Professor in Anthropology
- Pablo Sendra, Associate Professor in Planning and Urban Design
- Helena Titheridge, Professor of Mobility and Sustainable Transport
Professional Services
Communications
- Srijana Gurung, Senior Communications Manager
- Yossie Olaleye, Communications Manager
- Abi Luter, Events Manager (maternity leave)
- Dana Sousa-Limbu, Events Manager (maternity cover)
- Gen Williams, Communications Officer
Marketing
- Hannah McGuire, Senior Marketing Manager
- Saralyn White, Marketing Manager
- Desart Ismaili, Outreach Manager
- Van Anh Dang, Marketing Officer (maternity leave)
- Dhanesh Rathod, Marketing Officer (maternity cover)
Teaching and Learning
- Francesca Harrison-Quah, Education Coordinator
- Robert Heller, Education Manager
- Valentina Riverso, Education Administrator