Ken Worpole: writer and environmentalist
Ken Worpole is one of Britain's most influential writers on architecture, landscape and urban social policy issues, and the author of many seminal reports and books. He has lectured and worked extensively in Europe, Australia and North America. In 1999 he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate by Middlesex University. In 2007 he was appointed a Senior Professor in the Cities Institute at London Metropolitan University

His work concerns the quality of contemporary urban life, and he has worked with the think-tanks, Comedia & Demos, on new forms of civil society, notably on the planning and design of urban landscapes, the renewal of public institutions – notably parks, public libraries, hospices and cemeteries – as well as the pleasures of life in the open air.

From 2001 – 2002 he served as a member of the UK government's Urban Green Spaces Task Force. In 2001 he also took on the role of English Editor to the UNITED NATIONS CENTRE FOR HUMAN SETTLEMENTS report The State of the World's Cities, published in New York in June 2001. In 2002 he was appointed as an expert adviser to the Historic Buildings and Land Panel of the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), and in 2003 to the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE), notably on issues concerning the contemporary public domain. He writes and reviews for The Independent, Prospect and the Times Higher Educational Supplement, as well as the online political forum openDemocracy.

Ken has lived with his family in Hackney, East London, for more than 30 years, and is married to Larraine Worpole, the photographer. Much of his current work explores the history and topography of the Essex and Thames coastal and river landscapes.

For lecturing purposes, you can contact him at: worpole@blueyonder.co.uk
All photographs on this site by Larraine Worpole.