London’s Knowledge Clusters briefing

Merchant Land welcomed the opportunity to attend this briefing on 29 January to discuss the value of Knowledge Clusters to London, and the UK. The event was held at The Francis Crick Institute in King’s Cross, a remarkable building designed to encourage collaboration, innovation, and transparency, in biomedical research.

This event was a follow-up to the launch of the report, London’s Knowledge Clusters, in October 2018.

Speakers included:

• Kat Hanna, Associate Director (Urban Change – London Markets) at Cushman & Wakefield (moderator)
• John Anderson, Director of Financial Strategy at Imperial College London
• Sven Bunn, Life Science Advisor at Whitechapel Development
• Nick Carter, Director of Facilities & Infrastructure at The Francis Crick Institute
• David Green, Principal at Perkins+Will
• David Joyce, Head of Placeshaping at London Borough of Camden
• Juliette Morgan, Head of Campus (Regent’s Place) at British Land
• Jack Sallabank, Founder of Future Places Studio and author of London’s Knowledge Clusters

A key theme running throughout the session was how Knowledge Clusters come to be – through serendipity such as by being in the midst of good transport links and in being close to some of the world’s leading universities; top down planning, policies and priority setting; and, bottom up, through people and networks. It is here that the property market and developers have a clear role to play – in developing adaptive buildings and spaces that bring these factors together.

Click here to download the report from the City Property Association’s website.