Anthony Pearce


Communications, publishing and community engagement for the built environment

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Phoenix press & awards

Editing / writing / project management / communications
Human Nature has received a remarkable amount of press. I worked closely with press agencies – Peanut & Crumb / Maison (2022-2023) and Zetteler (ongoing since 2024) – shaping messaging, drafting releases and meeting journalists to secure the coverage listed below. The Phoenix has also won numerous awards; I wrote and submitted the entries for each. 


Interview and comment

  • Rowan Moore reviews The Phoenix in The Observer, here
    Phineas Harper on the "remarkable" Phoenix in The Guardian, here
  • Interview: Founder & CEO Jonathan Smales in Building Design, here
  • Interview: Chief Impact Officer Joanna Yarrow in Architecture Today, here
  • Interview: Human Nature’s Phoenix takes flight, Estates Gazette, here.
  • Profile: Jonathan Smales, Greenpeace director turned sustainable developer, Riba Journal, here.
  • Human Nature founder and CEO Jonathan Smales' comment piece in the Architects’ Journal about how architects and others should look to what Steve Jobs called ‘deep collaboration’ to tackle the climate crisis, here.
  • Property Week interview with Jonathan about the Phoenix and Human Nature's wider mission of inspiring a new social imagination, here.

News

  • Where does food fit into the town of the future? in The Grocer, here
  • Phoenix rising: Plans for the ‘largest timber development in UK’ take shape, Building Magazine, here.
  • Who’s who of architects reveal plans for 700-home timber scheme in Lewes, Architects’ Journal, here.
  • Plans unveiled for derelict town centre site, BBC News, here.
  • Lewes timber building scheme offers glimpse of net-zero future, in The Times, here.
  • Former Greenpeace directors lodge plans for ‘Europe’s most regenerative development’, Building Design, here.
  • £370m timber neighbourhood plans revealed, Construction Week, here.
  • Plans for 700 home and hotel development on ‘neglected’ South Downs brownfield site in Lewes, Sussex Live, here.
  • Plans for new riverfront neighbourhood on former Phoenix Industrial Estate, Sussex Express, here
  • Plans for a sustainable neighbourhood in Lewes to be exhibited, Sussex Express, here
  • The Phoenix: a bold new adventure in sustainable places, Transition Town Lewes, here.
  • The Phoenix Project – building a five-minute neighbourhood for Lewes, Transition Town Lewes, here
  • New developer to take control of North Street Quarter scheme in Lewes,  Sussex Express, here
  • Coverage of David Cowans’ appointment as co-chair in Inside Housing and Prime Resi

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Radio & podcasts‍

  • The Phoenix on the Open City podcast, The Brief. Listen here.
  • Jonathan Smales on Grant Gibson's Matter Matters. Listen here.
  • Jonathan Smales on Massive Small. Listen here.
  • Jonathan Smales on Monocle Radio’s Urbanist podcast to discuss the Phoenix and the benefits of shared living. Listen here.

Awards

Winner in the Regeneration & Masterplanning category in The Architectural Review Future Projects Awards 2023. Launched in 2002, the AR Future Projects awards are a window into tomorrow’s cities. Spanning 12 categories, they celebrate excellence in unbuilt and incomplete projects, and the potential for positive contribution to communities, neighbourhoods and urban landscapes around the world. The judges said: “The Phoenix is a radical response in the context of conservative British planning, promoting positive urban values to densify and extend British towns." More here.

Winner of Future Place 2023 at The Pineapples, hosted by magazine and media company The Developer and Festival of Place. The awards celebrate the very best in placemaking, "recognising excellence with an exciting programme and a commitment to recognising projects that make a positive social, environmental and economic impact".

Nominated for the Community Engagement award 2024 at The Pineapples.

An honourable mention in the Oslo Architecture Triennale’s Neighbourhood Index. The jury said: "The Phoenix project promises the development of a new neighbourhood as an alternative to the planning norm in the UK, not only by moving away from the reliance on private cars. The project seeks to demonstrate that sustainable materials can be used at scale, that developments can increase biodiversity and that there is a real appetite for places that enable easy, communal and low-impact lives. The plan, developed through a cohesive process, features car-sharing, on-site recycling, composting, urban farming and other waste management facilities. If all these promising ambitions are turned into reality by Human Nature, it will indeed be an achievement for more ambitious neighbourhood thinking – and doing – in the UK and beyond."  More here.

©2024 Anthony Pearce 
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