Landings Studio is a family centred design practice that utilises the co-founders background in horticulture and architecture.
Our Team
Dave
Dave is our resident plantsman. He began his career as an architectural draftsman and is now a qualified horticulturalist who’s worked in commercial nurseries, as a landscaping site coordinator and as a designer in a boutique landscape design practice.
When he’s not in the Landings Studio, you’ll find his hands in the dirt managing the productive garden at a local hospitality high school. He is a practical problem solver and details-focused practitioner with an exceptional horticultural knowledge of subtropical plants, including endemic species and permaculture principles.
He thrives in collaboration and conversation with fellow gardeners and guides our clients purposefully in achieving horticultural outcomes that suit their budget, lifestyle, skills, aesthetics and interests. As parents and partners in life and business, Emma and Dave collaborate to ensure architectural and horticultural objectives are pursued simultaneously.
We integrate Dave’s knowledge into and across all our work and we would love to hear from you if you have a project in mind that could benefit from horticultural expertise or if you’d like some on-site garden mentoring.
Emma
Emma has been working in architectural practice across a variety of scales and typologies from housing, healthcare, institutional and education sectors for 18 years. She grew up in the north-western suburbs of Meanjin and it’s this bioregion and specific subtropical climate that she seeks to know and contribute to.
Em has a passion for community led projects and social justice. In 2019 the Australian Institute of Architects awarded her the Queensland Emerging Architect Prize recognising her contributions to design and the broader community. Emma has also worked as a project manager for Architects Without Frontiers and a past Associate of Parlour, an organisation advocating for equity in the built environment.
Em founded Landings Studio with her husband garden designer David Pratt because they wanted to experiment with a kind of practice that blurs the boundaries between horticulture and architecture and allowed them to co-parent more collaboratively. Ultimately their personal life and professional practices merge and they are particularly interested in supporting sustainable food systems and democratic education.
Emma’s intention is to serve the people in her local community and apply her knowledge and skills to projects in her neighbourhood. She believes in the fundamental importance of research in professional practice and maintain teaching and academic roles as well as seeking opportunities for independent research.
Emma is particularly excited about the potential for architecture as an activist practice and is looking forward to some exciting teaching opportunities in 2023!
Cait
Cait’s versatility and flexibility is invaluable to us. She has been working in the design and architecture industry since the age of nineteen and understands the complexities and nuances of the architectural process whilst being a passionate advocate for design as a discipline, as well as designers as people. Her empathy and intuition allows her to connect easily with a diverse array of people.
A talented designer and maker in her own right, she shares the studio’s concern for sustainability, designing bespoke handmade recycled jewellery under her label Flame and Pickle.
Cait relishes the agility required to work in small business and has played administrative roles in many such ventures for the last 18 years, turning her hand at bookkeeping, marketing, human resources, practice management, communications, business development and so many other facets of business.
With three young children and a husband also working in architecture, she supports us to experiment with ways of working that nurture family life. Cait offers a unique and invaluable perspective that is practical and responsive and is in many ways the heart of this little family business.
Anna
Anna has over five years experience in architectural practice and is passionate about the role of design in cultivating identity and belonging. She has worked on community engagement projects for the Greens – visioning sustainable and inclusive possibilities for Brisbane’s public places.
Throughout her studies she collaborated with a group of colleagues on the Gabba Vision, utilising their skills to consult the community and advocate for better public space outcomes and catalysing a broader public conversation about this significant site. During her masters year she undertook an Urban Design elective which allowed her to explore her skills outside the expected architectural realm, defining a vision for young people in Logan.
Anna has an innate aptitude for graphic and written communication which complements her design abilities. She recently returned from a summer in Scotland where she undertook practical workshops in traditional building techniques as part of the Prince’s Trust Foundation scholarship.
We value Anna’s careful attentiveness to place and details that enhance our work immensely. She loves to sing, swim and garden, relishing the humble wonder of life in the subtropics.