Matthew Potter

Matthew leads the Hong Kong office and has played a pivotal role in many of the practice’s award-winning projects in the region. He recently completed the ‘Sky Bridge’ at Hong Kong International Airport, the world’s longest airside bridge. He is currently working on the restoration of the Grade I listed State Theatre; new conservatories for the China National Botanical Garden; and a state-of-the-art campus on Pokfield Road for the University of Hong Kong.
Before moving to Hong Kong, Matthew worked on a number of landmark projects including London King’s Cross Gasholders; Guangzhou International Finance Centre; and was the project architect for the Cooled Conservatories at Singapore’s Gardens by the Bay, working on the project from its inception to its successful completion in 2012.

My Sustainability Goals for 2024:

1. Our buildings to have a more considered relationship with the outside: much more use of passive means of environmental control before using highly-efficient active systems powered by renewable energy. Buildings that have shaded, outdoor amenity spaces from which users can feel, see and hear changes in the day, and not always find themselves hermetically sealed into highly-glazed, artificially-lit air-conditioned boxes.

2. ⁠More and better use of our existing buildings: less ‘slash and burn’ new development and greater use of what we already have. Discussions about embodied carbon are at their early stages in Hong Kong and there are huge gains (and huge carbon savings) to be made by refurbishing and retrofitting existing buildings.

3. ⁠More greening of our city’s buildings: amazingly, 70% of Hong Kong is green but the city and its streets remain hard and artificial. To encourage people to connect more with nature, to walk to work and to open the windows of our buildings we need to incorporate more greening on, in and over our buildings.