The International Garden Cities Institute brings together knowledge on Garden Cities and planned settlements across the world to act as a resource centre, sharing information and exploring their legacy and contemporary practice. It commissions research on all facets of creating successful new settlements, including sustainability, community aspects, master planning, building technologies, stewardship and financial models. Through global partnerships it advocates Garden City Principles where appropriate, working with representatives of Garden Cities from across the world, professional organisations, government and researchers and those involved in building new settlements. The focus is on creating great places to live and work.

Having launched with a range of renowned Founding Partners the Institute plans a series of thinkpieces covering topics such as modern garden cities, the between health and new towns, the role of communities in new place-making, alternative stewardship models, how to stop communities failing, the importance of good design, alternative mapping methods to help new place-making, migration and building methods. Several research projects underway at postgraduate level. The Institute’s academically-robust research will enhance knowledge of Garden Cities and advance debate on future planned settlements and the retrofitting of existing places. There is a particular emphasis on the cultural, social, and community components of the Garden City model, to widen the focus beyond master planning. Under the auspices of the Institute’s Academic Director, Dr Susan Parham, from the University of Hertfordshire, the Institute is conducting or planning research on a wide range of themes: urbanism and architecture, heritage, sustainability including food resilience, stewardship, governance, social purpose and economics among others. It is intended that the results of research will be widely disseminated, and contribute to the Institute’s growing repository of information about Garden Cities worldwide: the International Garden Cities Compendium.

Robust research will regularly be published. Funding streams are being established including a small annual fee for members, regular conferences, publications. Research findings will be published regularly through our website, events and publications. The plan is to build towards an international conference in 2020, five years after our launch.

Under the auspices of the Institute’s Academic Director, Dr Susan Parham, from our lead academic partner, the University of Hertfordshire, the Institute is conducting or planning research on a wide range of themes including the history, heritage and contemporary practice of Garden Cities; their architecture, design and urbanism; the impact of the wider context of planned settlements; the nature and likely future of Garden Cities worldwide; the stewardship, governance and delivery aspects of managing Garden Cities for community benefit; the sustainability of Garden Cities and more. The Institute’s research is intended to underpin understanding and knowledge about Garden Cities and their wider social, economic, environmental, historical and contemporary context. There is a particular emphasis on the cultural, social, and community components of the Garden City Model, to advance the debate on future planned settlements and retrofitting existing places, and widen the focus beyond master planning. The Institute is run by an Operations Team with workstreams led by individuals drawn from our partners. All research is overseen by the Academic Director Susan Parham, of the University of Hertfordshire, through our partnership agreement.

University of Hertfordshire, Sichuan University, Centre of Excellence in Architecture, Environment & Building Cultures (LabEx AE&CC) at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Grenoble, Cambridge University, RIBA (Royal Institution of British Architects), International Federation of Housing and Planning, The Prince’s Foundation for Building Communities, Letchworth Garden City Heritage Foundation, Town and Country Planning Association and many more