Helen is an urban planner and a Lecturer in Sustainable & Healthy Built Environments in the Bartlett Faculty of the Built Environment at University College London.

Her research focuses on how property development, regeneration and urban policy can support health and sustainability. Helen has expertise in the development of urban health metrics and their application in policy and design processes. Her work on healthy urbanism brings together diverse theory and evidence to redefine existing understandings of healthy place-making, putting greater emphasis on the interconnected imperatives of inclusion, equity and sustainability.

Prior to joining UCL in 2018, she worked as an urban planner for over a decade on new developments and planning policy in the UK and internationally. She has worked at the Building Research Establishment, Local Government Association and in national and local government in the areas of sustainable urbanisation, health, climate change and low carbon energy. She has been a Design Council Built Environment Expert since 2015 and a chartered member of the Royal Town Planning Institute since 2016. She holds numerous expert advisory roles for governments and industry internationally.