Architects as Guardians of Place: Reflections on the ING Architecture Tomorrow Report

Conversations

20 Apr

Earlier this month Andy attended a roundtable hosted by ING, to mark the launch of their second Architecture Tomorrow report. The report, subtitled Guardians of Place, sets out a case for architects moving from service providers to strategic agents in policy, climate mitigation, and public discourse. ING are a communications consultancy specialising in the built environment.

The discussion centred on a core proposition: architecture, and architects, can no longer be defined solely by the production of buildings. The profession must take responsibility for shaping, stewarding and sustaining places over time.

The Roundtable Discussion

ING convened a group of practice leaders to test what this shift means in practice, and what needs to change for architects to operate at this scale. Several themes emerged from the conversation that I found useful.

The framing of the architect as guardian of form versus guardian of place came up repeatedly. Long-term performance and impact — what a building or neighbourhood does over decades, not just at completion — needs to be front of mind. That sits uneasily with procurement models that reward speed and cost control over stewardship.

Underrepresentation in policymaking came up as a persistent structural problem. The report's own data shows that 54% of UK local authorities report skills shortages in architecture and urban design, yet the profession's role in national planning and infrastructure conversations remains largely advisory. Architects are consulted late, or not at all.

There was a genuine conversation about the limits of working within architectural silos. Several people made the point that addressing complex societal challenges — housing, climate adaptation, community cohesion — requires architects to work alongside other specialisms: anthropologists, social researchers, economists. That demands a broader understanding of project dynamics and who actually benefits from the decisions being made.

Two other themes: the need for education and training to catch up, equipping future architects with skills around stewardship and long-term thinking; and a clear view from the room that craft and traditional architectural values must remain central as the scope of the role expands.

On values specifically, ING's observation, which I think is accurate, is that architects are deeply values-driven as a profession. They care about place and long-term impact, even when market conditions or procurement models make that harder to sustain. The challenge is making those values legible to clients, investors and policymakers in ways that build trust and shape decisions earlier in the process.

Reuse and Retrofit as a Market Position

The report's clearest argument is that adaptive reuse is no longer a values position — it is a commercial one. Retaining a building's structure and envelope can reduce embodied carbon by 50–75% compared to an equivalent new build. For investors and developers, reuse also means faster delivery, lower planning risk, and a shorter route to income.

This resonates with a significant part of our workload. Extending and refurbishing existing homes — rather than replacing them — has been the core of our residential practice for years. The work at Apartment 402, Alaska Factory in Bermondsey is a direct example: a roof extension that transforms a one-bedroom flat into a three-bedroom family home, within a locally listed complex, adding floor area without touching the footprint of the site.

Our refurbishment of a Victorian terrace in Camberwell — House for Zola — achieved an A++ embodied carbon rating. The report's framing of retrofit as a business case rather than a sustainability gesture reflects exactly how we approach that kind of brief.

Heritage as Infrastructure, Not Constraint

The report cites Singapore's conservation planning model as an example of heritage policy done well: over 7,200 buildings conserved, with architects given a defined role in assessing and transforming existing assets. The argument is that heritage should be treated as strategic infrastructure rather than a planning obstacle.

In London, the reality is more fragmented. Conservation area policy varies by borough, and the quality of pre-application engagement varies too. At Alaska Factory, we went through two rounds of pre-application consultation with Southwark Council before arriving at the consented design. The process was worthwhile — each round of feedback produced a better proposal — but it requires architects who understand how to work with, not against, the heritage planning system.

Much of our project work sits within conservation areas: Lavender Cottage in West Sussex, Wharf 78 in Wapping, and Alaska Factory in Bermondsey. Navigating these contexts is not incidental to what we do — it is central to it.

The Visibility Problem

One data point in the report that stayed with me: the share of WA100 firm coverage appearing in the world's top 10% of media outlets fell from 8.8% in 2021 to 5.6% in 2025. Architects are becoming less visible in mainstream public discourse at precisely the moment when the profession's contribution to climate, housing and heritage is most relevant.

The report's recommendation is to treat communications as a core business function and a leadership tool — not a post-project add-on. It also flags the growing importance of owned channels — your website, your writing, your project documentation — as primary sources for both readers and AI-driven search. In a landscape where more than half of online searches are projected to happen inside AI-powered assistants rather than via traditional search engines, the stories that trusted media and owned channels tell about a practice directly influence what future clients and decision-makers find.

That is a direct argument for what we have been building here: a body of written work on the projects, the process, and the problems we solve. Specific enough to be useful — not marketing copy.

What This Means in Practice

The report ends with eight recommendations. Several are aimed at large practices with dedicated communications teams and policy budgets. Three translate directly to smaller studios:

• Define and demonstrate your value proposition. A clear, repeatable narrative about what the practice stands for — consistently expressed across all external communications.

• Make reuse central to your narrative. Highlight retrofit and circular design in case studies and thought leadership, framing carbon savings and heritage value as design outcomes.

• Strengthen owned channels. Structure your website and published content with clear language and robust sourcing — these feed both human readers and the AI systems increasingly used to find and evaluate practices.

This studio operates on a permanent four-day week — 32 hours, no reduction in pay — accredited to Gold Standard by the 4 Day Week Foundation. How a practice organises itself is part of the value proposition too. The values page sets out what the studio stands for in full.