The annual Work Place / Work Life conference brings together Australasia’s leading practitioners in workplace design and wellbeing. In 2015, the one-day forum will take place on 18 August 2015 at Eternity Playhouse in Sydney, where local and international keynote speakers will join a range of panellists to discuss the issues shaping workplace design.

International architects Clive Wilkinson and Colin Seah, and social entrepreneur Jan Owen will make keynote addresses at the 2015 forum.

Clive Wilkinson is president and design director of Clive Wilkinson Architects and a global leader in workplace design. His projects include One Shelley Place in Sydney designed in collaboration with Woods Bagot and the Barbarian Group in New York, winner of the Office category at the 2014 INSIDE World Festival of Interiors Awards. In his keynote address titled The Theatre of Work, Wilkinson will draw on these examples, and others including Googleplex and workplaces for Disney, to discuss the critical forces that have shaped the modern workplace.

Colin Seah is founder and director of Ministry of Design in Singapore. Trained in the US, Seah has worked for the likes of Rem Koolhaas and Daniel Liebeskind. His studio’s Barcode Office was winner of the Office category at the inaugural Inside Awards in 2011 and Seah was also made Designer of the Year by the International Design Awards USA in 2010. His keynote address, Heigh Ho, Heigh Ho, It’s Off to Work We Go, Seah will discuss the rapidly changing nature of the contemporary workplace from his perspective in the global business hub of Singapore.

Jan Owen is CEO of Foundation for Young Australians. She was previously director of Social Ventures Australia and has served on the boards of Australian National Development Index and RMIT College of Business Industry Advisory Board. Owen was named the inaugural Woman of Influence in 2012 by the Australian Financial Review and Westpac Bank. Her keynote presentation will explore questions such as: What will work look like in the future? In what industries will we be working in and in what way? What will the future workforce expect from future employers?

The panellists include:

• Robert Backhouse, managing director, Hassell
• Antoinette Trimble, strategic workstyle consultant, Veldhoen + Company
• Zrinka Lovrencic, managing director, Great Place to Work Australia
• Richard Francis-Jones, design director, Francis-Jones Morehen Thorp
• Donna Wheatley, associate and workplace design leader, Warren and Mahoney Architects
• Philip Vivian, director, Bates Smart

Download full program here and book tickets here.

Work Place/Work Life, presented by Architecture Media, is part of Design Speaks, a series of talks, seminars, forums and conferences on and about architecture and design, for design professionals and their clients and interested members of the wider community.

Work Place/Work Life is supported by ISIS Group, Planned Cover, Taubmans, Planex, Singapore Tourism Board and Space Furniture.