Our first speaker is Helen Kerr, Principal at Isthmus and a landscape architect and urban designer with 25 years of experience leading projects with community at their core.

Helen will share the story of Westport’s Adaptation Masterplan, ‘Cutting Our Own Track’, exploring how community-minded, place-led approaches can help navigate climate uncertainty and shift behaviours and mindsets. In 2025, the masterplan was nationally recognised by Local Government New Zealand as a “playbook on humanity, demonstrating how to move a community with dignity.”

Contact the host of Urban Design Forum | Inspiring Women Shaping the Urban Agenda: Helen Kerr