Director Loretta Lees Wins International Planning History Society (IPHS) Book Prize

Initiative on Cities Director Loretta Lees and co-author Elanor Warwick received the biennial International Planning History Society’s (IPHS) First Book Prize for their book Defensible Space on the Move: Mobilisation in English Housing Policy and Practice.

The First Book Prize recognizes innovative planning history books based on original research. Defensible Space weaves oral history, in-depth interviews, and archival research through the voices and insights of academic, practitioner, and governmental circles. It compares the implementation and conceptualization of “defensible space” in the context of reducing crime in public housing (from the United States) in the United Kingdom. The book synthesizes the expertise of Director Lees, an urban geographer, and Dr. Warwick, an architect, to write the story of this approach to public housing development.

Director Lees and Dr. Warwick accepted their award via Zoom at the IPHS biennial conference held in Hong Kong from July 2 to 5, 2024.

In case you missed it, Director Lees and Dr. Warwick also appeared on the A is for Architecture podcast in late February 2024 to discuss defensible space: