Anna Gnecco

I grew up in Genoa, Northern Italy, where I spent many afternoons exploring the impenetrable fabric of the historical centre and wondering what makes it so special.

The fascination for the livelihood and quality of the public offer within such density, played a key role shaping my final year project at the polytechnic school of Genoa, the reconversion of a dismissed industrial site in Durban (SA) into a vibrant mixed use neighbourhood, which was awarded the 1st prize for the UIA Durban Rivertown international student competition.

In search for new challenges, I moved to the UK in 2014 and I learnt the power of BIM when working on the design and construction stages of large scale healthcare and residential schemes, at Edward Williams Architects and Hamiltons Architects.

In April 2018 I joined Studio Egret West and since then I have been working on large scale, high density schemes. I love taking care of these projects comprehensively from every angle, and I put all my efforts to make sure that the key design principles and place-making ingredients stay alive throughout the development of the project, whilst maintaining scheme viability.

At the moment I am focused on the submission of Cotton Quay’s hybrid application, an exciting new neighbourhood and destination in Salford’s historical docks. The challenging, super high density of the scheme lead to creative solutions to provide unusual and an exciting public realm offer from otherwise leftover spaces, such as the rooftop of a car park transformed into a play space, and a series of artificial basins made accessible and usable by the public as a new lido. Other projects include New Bermondsey and the refurbishment of Balfron Tower.

As an enthusiastic team player, I am leading the studio cycle club as well as coordinator for the work experience education programme at SEW. Since my love for my hometown is not diminished, I am one of the co-founder of New-gen, a non-profit association for the promotion and development of Genoa.