16th May 2024
Katy Harris leads Foster + Partners’ Communications team, overseeing all aspects of the practice’s communications activity including PR and exhibitions, marketing, graphics, image archive, book and journal libraries and research.
Katy tells us about her interest in Bauhaus design, an impactful college trip to the Sainsbury Centre, and the practice’s latest exhibition at the Seoul Museum of Art.
A standout project
The Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, which brought tears to my eyes when visiting on my art college trip in 1980. Its radical design made quite the impression – I joined Foster Associates the following year.
Earliest memory at Foster + Partners
Finding a photo of myself at the Sainsbury Centre in the slide collection, during my first week in 1981.
A mentor
When I joined, my first mentors were my tutor James Meller, also a part-time graphic designer at the practice, Birkin Haward and Jan Kaplicky, the architects who guided me through the first 3 years and taught me everything I needed to know about Norman and the practice.
Where do you call home?
I live in Battersea, London, which is only 12 minutes away from the office on my bike – 15 minutes home because it is uphill! I have cycled to work (almost) every day for the last 25 years.
A recent source of inspiration
Bauhaus design, for the way it reduces architectural design down to the most essential minimalist and elegant forms – and for the beautiful graphic and textile designs that came out of the movement.
A recent venture
We have just opened ‘Future Positive,’ our first ever exhibition in Korea, at the Seoul Museum of Art.
A primary theme for the exhibition is ‘Culture and Retrofit.’ A cultural building can reinvent and regenerate its place, have a symbolic presence, communicate with the public, and break down physical and social barriers.
It also features an immersive space that allows visitors to view our projects in a wholly new way. Large-format images are projected around people in 360 degrees, while the buildings’ floorplans cover the floor from wall to wall.
It was great fun putting this one together.
Your favourite city to visit
Siena, Tuscany, for my earliest impression of medieval beauty as a child and London for never ending quality entertainment. I am a regular at the National Theatre on the South Bank of the river Thames, a wonderful example of Brutalist architecture, and the new Bridge Theatre, a more recent addition to theatreland by Haworth Tompkins.
A city we should learn from
Paris – walkable, beautiful, buzzing, dense, cultivated. I spent quite a bit of time there last year, while we were working on the ‘Norman Foster’ retrospective at the Pompidou Centre.
A favourite project to visit?
Millau Viaduct – I love it and have been over it multiple times. It was a huge thrill being there for the opening in 2004. My mum asked to see it for her 80th birthday, it takes my breath away every time I cross it.
Early bird or night owl?
Early bird, I start the day at 6.30am with Radio 4 news, breakfast, and coffee while checking my emails.
One thing you can’t live without
Gloves on a cold day – an essential when cycling to work in the winter!
