07/08/2026
We are incredibly proud of our Partner, Ngaio Chalmers, who has recently been made a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Architects!
As a practice leader and a mother of two, Ngaio has brought both lived experience and strategic insight to shaping more supportive pathways for people and families in our profession.
Ngaio is a strong advocate for inclusivity, engagement and co-design, and community focused to her core. She is the Chair of the Architecture + Design industry’s RAP RING (Reconciliation Industry Network Group), a non-Indigenous member of ClarkeHopkinsClarke Architects’ First Nations Design group working to embed designing with respect for Country into commercial practice, recently joined the AIA Gender, Equity and Diversity Committee, and actively driven a number of our internal policies regarding Equity and Diversity.
She played a key role in creating ClarkeHopkinsClarke’s progressive Parental Leave Policy, launched in 2022, helping advance a more inclusive and equitable workplace culture for our team and the wider industry.
Throughout her 20-year career across Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand, Ngaio’s experience has been enriched by informal mentorship, and she is in turn generous in supporting others: mentoring colleagues and contributing formally through the Property Council’s 500 Women in Property program.
Through her work as a practice leader in our Community and Culture team, Ngaio continually champions safer spaces, both in the built environment and in the way we communicate, collaborate and engage. Working across diverse cultures and building typologies, she brings careful consideration to questions of cultural safety, security and belonging, particularly in our work with First Nations communities.
Her Fellowship recognition reflects not only her enthusiastic and wide-ranging professional contribution, but also her ongoing commitment to inclusive practice, meaningful mentorship and architecture’s capacity to serve communities with care. Please join us in congratulating Ngaio on this well-deserved milestone.
