Melissa Sterry

A Visiting Fellow at the School of Art & Design, Visiting Lecturer at the 6* RAE-rated School of the Built Environment and Assembly member at the University of Salford, Melissa is a Guest Critic at the AA School of Architecture and a PhD Researcher at the Advanced Virtual and Technological Architecture Research group at the School of Design, Architecture and Construction at the University of Greenwich. Her qualifications include a BA (Hons) in Design Practice and a Postgraduate Certificate in Innovation and Enterprise.

Melissa is a Keynote Speaker, Panel Chair and Workshop Host at leading sustainability conferences and seminars worldwide, including EcoBuild, European Future Energy Forum, Forum for the Built Environment, Sustainable Business in Practice, Tomorrow’s Natural Business Conference, International Bionic Engineering Conference and the World Congress on Sustainable Technologies. Published in over 50 international titles, including sustain’ magazine of which she is an Editorial Board member.

Melissa and her work have featured in over 100 international publications, including Planet Green, TreeHugger, Good Magazine, Design Week, Marketing Week, PR Week, Financial Times, The Guardian and The Hungton Post. On the Scientific Committee of the International Bionic Engineering Society, Melissa has sat on sustainability and social enterprise steering groups, non-executive boards, panels and committees for many organisations including WWF, International Design Awards, and the International Green Awards.

The founding director of catalyst for rapid innovation in sustainable design NEW FRONTIERS - 1st Prize Winner of the Great Exhibition 2012 competition and of sustainability think tank Societás, Melissa is an inductee of the Global Women Inventors and Innovators Network Hall of Fame and was the recipient of the Mensa Education and Research Foundation International Award for Benefit to Society 2010 for exceptional commitment to enhancing intelligence that benefits society.

Speaking Topics

Melissa’s skillset is varied yet focused and allows her speak effectively on all the following subjects: Futurist, Science & Technology, CSR, Art, Futurist, architecture, Environmental, Sustainability.

• Future Sustainable Cities - her PhD research is focused on knowledge transfer from natural technologies found in complex ecosystems in rainforests, savannahs, peat bogs and coral reefs to man-made design -to enable the creation of models for urban habitats that can anticipate and prepare for environmental changes, including firestorms, earthquakes, heat waves and flooding -creating greater resilience to natural disasters and improving overall efficiency (inc energy, water, food, waste).
• Sustainable innovation in design, media and communications -including product design, fashion design, spatial design, graphic design, digital and the visual arts. I've headed many projects in this space, given several talks on these areas, hosted a number of workshops, lectured to both undergraduate and postgraduate university students and written a number of cover stories for both consumer and trade magazines.
• Trend forecasting and futurology -spanning design/technology innovation, societal trends -life/work models, the arts and culture -this is the primary area that my work essentially focuses on.
• Environment and social justice issues -including climate change, biodiversity loss, natural resource depletion, food scarcity, water scarcity, pollution, sweatshop labour. She’s worked with large network of scientists, activists and strategists and examples of her professional activities in this space include sitting on a WWF think tank, sitting on a handful of campaign/charity steering groups and committees and providing comms support and strategy advice to a few dozen environment / social justice campaigns, for example drawing up the global comms strategy for a gender equality project.

For further information or to book Melissa Sterry, call us at Speakers Corner on +44 (0) 20 8365 3200 or email info@speakerscorner.co.uk