Benedict Zucchi
BDP Chair

Benedict is Chair of BDP, responsible for leading the global Board. He is an architect with over 30 years of experience leading major projects and fulfilling different leadership roles at Board level.  

A close reading of place and an abiding interest in user participation have remained common threads in Benedict’s projects, which range from mixed-use masterplans, schools and universities to designs for major hospitals. He has developed a particular reputation for the design of paediatric facilities, including Alder Hey Children’s Health Park in Liverpool, Great Ormond Street Children’s Cancer Centre in London and the National Children’s Hospital (NCH) in Dublin. This innovative high-profile facility has a strong affinity with the landscape approach developed at Alder Hey, which won the Prime Minister’s Best Public Building Award and an RIBA National Award in 2016. Careful manipulation of form breaks down the hospitals’ perceived scale and optimises their environmental performance, so that natural light, ventilation and views, combined with extensive gardens, create unparalleled therapeutic settings. 

A regular contributor to conferences and lecturer at architecture schools, he is also the author of Big House Little City, published in 2023, in which he makes the case for a holistic approach to the design of the built environment by fusing architectural and urban thinking – a methodology that facilitates user participation and capitalises on context.