Don't Move, Improve! Judge introduction

Ellie Pile

Programme Manager

Introducing the Don’t Move, Improve! Judges

Don’t Move, Improve! encourages great design in everyday life, celebrating the newest and most innovative home improvement projects from across London. The annual competition – now celebrating its 11th year – aims to showcase the diversity and character of homes being redesigned in London.

This year Don’t Move, Improve! will feature 100 of the best home extensions built in London over the past two years, 22 of which have been selected for the shortlist and are in the running for the special prizes and overall winner of the competition. Our new Peer Review Panel and our esteemed Jury have rigorously reviewed all the projects submitted and have selected the featured and shortlisted schemes which we are excited to announce next Wednesday 24th March.

The Don’t Move, Improve! Jury 2021

Our jury includes experts from across the industry, this year’s Jury includes:

Kunle Barker, Melt Property, COO
Melissa Dowler, Director, Bell Phillips Architects
Tom Foxall, Head of Region for London and South East, Historic England

Peter Murray, Curator-in-chief, New London Architecture

Karen Stylianides, Editor, Grand Designs Magazine

Amin Taha, Director, Groupwork
Tamsie Thomson, Director, London Festival of Architecture

Sebastian Wood, Founder, Whitby Wood

‘Our connection with home has grown stronger over the last 12 months. We are now more connected to our homes, neighbours, and families than we have ever been. So perhaps now it is more important than ever that we improve the homes we love rather than severing some of those connections by moving. The Don’t Move Improve competition celebrates all types of home, of all sizes and has never failed to inspire people to make more of their Homes.’
Kunle Barker, Melt Property, COO

Peer Review Panel

Our Peer Review Panel was introduced this year to independently assess all of the projects submitted to the awards. The Panel, made up of the winning architects from Don’t More, Improve! 2020, selected the top 100 projects to be featured in this year’s programme.

The Panel includes:
Phil Coffey, Director, Coffey Architects
Christian Ducker, Director, Gundry & Ducker Architecture
Richard Keep, Principal, Richard Keep Architects
Oliver Leech, Founder, Oliver Leech Architects
Man Luo, Architect and Co-founder, Manyu architects

Mike Shaw, Director, Proctor and Shaw

Silvia Ullmayer, Founding Director, ullmayer sylvester architects

Check out the videos of last year’s winner projects here.

We are hugely grateful to our panel and judges for sharing their time, creative insight and expertise with us. The judging process always brings into light inspirational and dynamic discussion about the design of our homes which seems all the more pertinent this year.