Alastair Swayn Foundation announces round one 2024 grants program open

The Alastair Swayn Foundation has announced it is now accepting applications for its 2024 round one grants program, with successful applicants to be awarded funding for commencing design-related research.

The 2024 round one grants program opened on 1 March with two funding streams available: Design Thinking Grants and Design Strategy Grants. Individuals, groups and organizations can apply for either of the two streams until 12 April.

The Design Thinking Grants provide $5,000 to successful candidates to undertake a research project in architecture, landscape architecture, industrial design, heritage preservation and restoration, adaptive re-use of architecture or product design and designing for accessibility. The Design Strategy Grants will allocate $10,000 to successful applicants to conduct research on significant challenges within the fields of architecture and design in Australia.

The 2023 round two grant recipients have been revealed alongside the announcement that the 2024 round one program has opened for submissions. The categories for the 2023 round two program included Design Strategy, Design Thinking, an $8,000-$10,000 Design Audio grant and an International grant of up to $15,000.

The 2023 category winners are:

Tom Alves - Social Housing as a Site for Design Leadership and Innovation

Heliotope (Jane Caught) - Glass in the Anthropocene

Luka Enstrom and Brooke Jackson - Home Office - Feasibility of Housing in Vacant Commercial Office Buildings of Sydney

University of Canberra (Mike Louw, Sally Farrah, Max Maxwell, Sam Tomkins) - Second Ski

Deakin University (Akari Nakai Kidd) - A Home, Not Housing: Empowering Women Through Co-design of a Good-Home Design Blueprint

Melanie Mury (Mury Architects) - Girl Power: Design Solutions for an Equitable and Inclusive Future for Females in Sport

University of Sydney (Laura Goh) - Shared and sustainable future communities: removing regulatory barriers to innovative cohousing design in the Australian Capital Territory

Parlour (Justine Clark and Alison McFadye) - Parlour Pod - Summer Listening 2024

Susty Spec (Isabella Peppard) - Upfront: Conversations in Carbon

Open House Melbourne (Tania Davidge) - City and Regional Catalysts

Cottage Industries (Cristina Garduño Freeman, Vicki Leibowitz, Antonia Fredman, Nicholas Searle) - Not to Scale

RMIT (Adele Varcoe) - Feeling Fashion

Office (Simon Robinson) - Retain, Repair, Reinvest: An International Study of Exemplary Public Housing Tower Refurbishment Projects