Sophie Lanigan Projects presents Coastal Design Assembly 2026 at the MCA Lecture Theatre in Sydney on 26 August, a single evening gathering recent projects that work directly with coasts, harbours, headlands, pools, reefs and waterfronts.
The evening will feature six presentations, each speaker highlighting a single project rather than a studio’s whole portfolio – speaking to a room of designers, students, coastal practitioners and anyone who lives at the edge between city and sea.
The programme opens with the North Head Viewing Platform, presented together by CHROFI’s Steven Fighera and Bangawarra’s Shannon Foster and Jo Kinniburgh – a collaboration between the practice behind the Medallion-winning North Head Lookouts and two First Nations designers and knowledge holders working from Country.
Adrian McGregor of McGregor Coxall will speak about the Tsukiji Tokyo Urban Waterfront, brought to the room through the bio-urbanism thinking set out in his book. Peter Besley and Jessica Spresser present Pier Pavilion, from a Sydney studio whose material-led competition work includes a harbour pavilion of recycled oyster shells. Maya Martin-Westheimer of Floorplan Studio brings Walking with Aunty Maxine Ryan: A La Perouse Field Guide, a place-based collaboration; artist Anna May Kirk presents Living Sculptures, works that make slow environmental change perceptible; and host Sophie Lanigan closes with Between City and Sea, drawn from her PhD research on oysters, seascapes and rising coastlines.
The evening is built around a shared question, where each speaker responds to the same closing prompt – what one coastal intervention, design or idea they’d like to exist, and what would have to change to make it possible.
Date: Wednesday, 26 Aug 2026
Time: 6:00pm – 8:00pm
Price: $40
Location: Lecture theatre, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, 140 George Street, The Rocks, NSW 2000, Australia
Tickets are available here
