The Practice
Stead & Co. are a Chartered Architectural Practice based in the market town of Otley, and working nationally on a range of projects. We provide a full architectural and design service covering the RIBA work stages, from feasibility studies to contract administration.
We believe that everyone deserves well designed spaces and that our contribution to the built environment should be sustainable and robust; that it should be inspiring, safe, foster community and promote equality.
We have four key areas of expertise – buildings for the community including faith buildings, learning environments including schools, community engagement, and small scale residential – which we believe are of particular significance in creating more resilient and successful places. Our experience has given us the skills to work with a variety of clients to design and deliver buildings and spaces that respond to the needs of actual users, enabling stories to be told and positive changes to be made. Our projects have helped a pre-school pass an OFSTED inspection, significantly improved safeguarding in a number of primary schools, enabled a theatre goer to actually get into a building and encouraged someone to access a food bank without embarrassment. Our residential work has allowed a family to sit round the table for Christmas dinner without conflict and given independence to a young woman. For us, the key to creating sustainable places is to put the users at the very heart of it.
We also firmly believe that a built environment cannot be accessible to all if only a narrow section of society designed and built it. With this in mind, considerations of equality, diversity and inclusion are fundamental to Stead & Co. We have signed the RIBA Inclusion Charter and take those responsibilities seriously.
Stead & Co. are a small practice with a big network, and we actively operate as a collective, working collaboratively with a community of like-minded individuals who all believe that by knowledge-sharing and working together, we can overcome many of the challenges caused by the climate emergency and social inequality. In particular by sharing personal experiences, particularly those that differ from our own, we begin to break down barriers to and assumptions of the people for whom we are designing.
STEFANIE STEAD MBE SCA
Director
Stefanie is the Director at Stead & Co. Architects and specialises in community, educational and faith projects including a number of methodist churches, Fitzherbert Community Hub, Black Dyke Mills Heritage Venue, The Holbeck Working Mens Club, the Royal Horticultural Society and Guru Teghbahadur Gudwara.
Stefanie was awarded an MBE for Services to Construction and Architecture in 2019’s New Year’s Honours.
She is interested in architecture as a wider profession – exploring the possibilities of what ‘architecture’ is, and what it could be. She is particularly interested in the narratives of a place, whether historical, political, socio-economic or folklore. Indeed, stories – whether personal or created – allow a place to be reconsidered and interpreted in quite different and enlightening ways. Her passion is creating. Whether a masterplan, building or a quilt, the process of designing, creating and searching out answers to interesting questions influences every aspect of her life.
Her skills lie in being able to engage with a wide range of people, listening carefully and reading between the lines. In her experience some of the most important aspects of a project are things that are not always communicated, and these are the details that can make a project special. At the heart of this, Stefanie believes that it is crucial to involve those who will benefit from the process in the process. She has extensive experience of facilitating consultation and design workshops with a range of participants, ranging from Elected Members through to school children. She is also on the teaching staff of York College and has recently joined the ‘decolonising the curriculum’ focus group.
Safira Hussain
Affiliations
