This year, the jury recognises the leadership from Evolve Housing with the Arncliffe Community Hub in harnessing the power of placemaking to support a diverse range of disadvantaged and vulnerable people into emergency accommodation during COVID and create a sense of belonging and connection to community through placemaking. We want to acknowledge and celebrate the efforts to provide a whole of life experience and support-not just a roof–and the meaningful community connections that were created as a result. When the COVID pandemic hit, Evolve Housing turned around an upgrade to 142 units within 6 weeks to support rough sleepers off the streets, single parents, women and children escaping domestic violence, young people at risk of homelessness and people in urgent need of housing assistance. Rather than doing the minimum possible to house people, they didn’t stop there but instead approached this with a bold vision for how great placemaking has the capacity to create community–recognising that many people moving into the housing had no previous connection to Arncliffe and securing funding from philanthropic and government sources to enable it.

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Evolve Housing’s agile, community-led and place-based approach provided wrap around support to this instant community, creating a sense of community. They tailored their response to the needs of their community and the Jury were so impressed by what emerged–everything from a community garden built with the Community Greening Team which the community called the Garden of Eden, health drop-in sessions, free morning teas, homework and internet hubs, a mural painted by a resident, a street library and connections to services like training and employment. This was embraced by the community, creating a sense of belonging, with members stepping up to look after the garden and for example, a resident offering cooking classes to the community. Of the tenants surveyed, 100% felt supported and 78% felt that they were part of a community. While potentially not strictly everyone’s “definition” of placemaking, this project shone because of its clear illustration of how the use and recognition of place is critical to happy living. The jury were so impressed by this nomination because it is about true placemaking-about addressing difficult challenges that make a real difference to people’s lives, and about the value in place-based, community led approaches. The opportunity to thrive in great places should be available to everyone-this is at the core of 'just transition' and we celebrate the creativity, drive, innovation, kindness and leadership of Evolve Housing in making that happen.