The gap between university and practice is real. Students graduate with ideas, technical knowledge, and enthusiasm. What they’re missing is the lived experience of making decisions under real constraints, the confidence that comes from seeing something you’ve designed actually built, the understanding that good design happens through iteration, collaboration, and occasionally admitting your first idea wasn’t the right one.We’ve been running student placements across our studios for years now. Melbourne offers multiple 12-month paid positions annually. Perth partners with Curtin University on their graduate architecture programme. Sydney collaborates with the University of Western Sydney on live community projects. Genuine training grounds where emerging designers learn through doing.Students work on multi-residential developments, hospitality venues, commercial fit-outs, masterplanning. The projects are real. The deadlines are real. The learning curve is steep, but so is the growth.
Some who’ve come through our programme have worked their way up to director. Not because we planned a pipeline, but because they proved themselves capable and we recognised that.
Room to Develop
In Perth, we sponsor a paid internship award for Curtin’s top student and participate in their end-of-year reviews. We’re there in the room, looking at final-year work, asking questions as practitioners who remember what that moment feels like and understand the value of genuine feedback.Sajy Solah won the most recent internship. Prisca Gracesilia recently completed her placement with us. Designers learning how buildings actually come together, how clients think, how budgets shape decisions, how ideas adapt to reality without losing their intelligence.This year, the Sydney collaboration with UWS put third-year students to work on an arts, culture and community hub for Mount Druitt with the Salvation Army. Real site. Real brief. Real community needs. Shiraz Bawab won the paid internship for her vision of open green spaces and shared communal terraces. The runners-up all demonstrated work that showed genuine understanding of what the project demanded.
Melbourne takes a different approach, with an open call for applications from students across all universities. Outside of working on our projects, the students play a strong role in driving the culture at the studio – planning social events and leading monthly meetings.
What Actually HelpsEmerging designers need exposure to how projects are coordinated. How time gets managed. How to communicate with consultants, contractors, clients. How to present work clearly. How to defend ideas without ego. When to push and when to adapt.They need to understand that design intelligence means finding the best outcome within real constraints.Our student roles include design work and the operations that keep a studio functioning. Planning social events. Supporting reception. Contributing to studio culture. Because architecture is collaborative work, and understanding how a practice operates matters.
The students we bring in contribute. They work on presentation materials, design concepts, detailed documentation. They participate in monthly design competitions. They present their work. They receive feedback that’s direct, constructive, and useful. If you’re here, you’re learning. If you’re learning, you’re contributing. If you’re contributing, you’re valued.
Fresh EnergySupporting emerging designers is pragmatic. The profession needs new energy, perspectives that haven’t calcified into “how it’s always been done.” Students bring curiosity that challenges assumptions. They ask questions that make us reconsider our processes. They’re thinking about sustainability, community impact, and social responsibility in ways that push us forward.When we invest in someone’s first year of practice, we’re shaping the future of the profession. The designers coming through our studios today will be leading practices, teaching students, and pushing the industry forward in twenty years, and that’s worth the investment.
If yes, we’ve done our job.
What Success Looks LikeSuccess shows up in how prepared they are for whatever comes next, whether they stay with us or move elsewhere.Did they learn to think through complex problems? Do they understand how design decisions cascade through a project? Have they developed confidence in their own judgement? Did they experience the satisfaction of seeing something they worked on actually built?
Looking ForwardThe design industry is evolving. New technologies, new materials, new approaches to sustainability, new expectations from clients and communities. The designers emerging now will navigate a professional landscape that looks different from the one we entered.Our job is to give them the foundation to adapt, to think critically, to keep learning, and to bring intelligence and care to whatever they design.
Great design happens through collaboration, through the accumulated knowledge of everyone who’s done this work before you. It continues through the people we teach today.
The moment when a student realises they can solve a problem they thought was impossible? That’s when we know it’s working. That’s when the gap between university and practice starts to close. That’s when someone stops being a student and starts becoming a designer.And that moment makes all the time, all the teaching, all the patience worth it.
