Our content team
Prof. Ken McBryde
Professor Ken McBryde is an architect and urban designer who is passionate about social impact investment and specialises in culturally and climatically appropriate DfMA/Prefabrication in remote areas where people and their communities need help most.
His decorated career includes tenures with Renzo Piano Building Workshops in Paris and Genoa & Osaka between 1987 and 2001 where his projects included the design the Kansai International Airport Terminal, the upper deck stern form for The Crown Princess Cruise Liner and Aurora Place in Sydney’s Macquarie Street where he presented a Building Icons story for Qantas in-flight entertainment.
Ken has been a Principal at Hassell and founded the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat in NSW, is a Member of Sydney and Regional Planning Panel at NSW Department of Industry and Environment Planning, Adjunct Professor at University of Sydney and Conjoint Professor of Practice at University of Newcastle.
He is a volunteer architect at Australian Himalayan Foundation, Principal at Ken McBryde Architectural Physics and joined The Placemakers content team in 2020.
ken@theplacemakers.media
Roger Price
Roger is a Cinematographer and Director of Photography with more than 30 years’ experience shooting broadcast content throughout Australia and over 65 international destinations.
He has won 13 industry awards including multiple ACS/Gold awards for his work on television series, documentaries, and broadcast.
Fully compliant with construction industry OH&S practices and international broadcaster requirements, Roger has world class skills in cinematography, lighting, colour grading, broadcast design, location sound, stills photography and live multi-camera streaming services.
Roger is an original member of the production team has been shooting 4k and high definition stories for The Placemakers since 2017.
Amanda Steele
Named the 2019 Telstra Businesswoman of the Year in NSW, Amanda’s career has spanned government, corporate and not-for-profit sectors – with considerable experience advising leading organisations on strategy and delivery.
Between 2013 and 2015, Amanda was Pacific Head of Sustainability for CBRE, before assuming the senior leadership role to manage one of CBRE’s largest service lines, Property Management. Over three years, she doubled the growth of this business and delivered significant client outcomes through her innovative, creative, and people-focused approach.
Amanda then became the Executive Managing Director of one of CBRE’s largest geography businesses in the Pacific Region – Property Management, with more than 1400 properties, 800 clients and 750 staff across ten offices.
She has worked with the highest levels of government nationally and internationally, as well as alongside boards and CEOs of many organizations.
In 2024 Amanda became Head of Property for leading Australian Fund Manager ISPT.
Amanda is passionate about place driving culture and the inclusivity that great design can deliver. She is also an engaging and authoritative media performer and has been presenting The Placemakers on television since 2017.
Graeme Thomas
One of Australia’s leading writing based, factual and lifestyle broadcast producers, Graeme has formatted, funded, produced and distributed 65 television programs, 80 IFE features and 200 video stories that have reached more than four hundred million people across 74 countries.
Graeme is currently CEO / Executive Producer of igloo media, a company he founded in 2000. He has pioneered native content in Australia and won 4 international content marketing awards for his work on Breville Food Thinkers, Living Coffee and Luxury Escapes.
His production credits include lifestyle, travel and factual programming for Discovery Networks, National Geographic, News Corporation, Network 7, Network 9, Network 10, Tonic Health Media and Qantas In Flight Entertainment.
Graeme has a passion for architecture, design, urban planning, community engagement and all things placemaking. He believes effective storytelling is critical to future outcomes for built environments and has been creating media platforms for the industry since 2014. During this time, Graeme has worked extensively with the management teams of several leading property companies, their design partners, and agencies across Asia Pacific.
He has been Executive Producer on The Placemakers since 2017.
Susie Thomas
Susie has enjoyed an extensive media career spanning senior commercial and management roles at News Ltd, Fairfax and Igloo. At Fairfax she worked on The Sydney Morning Herald, Good Weekend, Good Food Guide and launched the inaugural Good Café Guide. During her time at igloo she has recruited chefs and restaurants for Breville Food Thinkers which was an award-winning online video and IFE channel that reached a cumulative audience of 800,000 viewers every month on the Breville database and on Qantas domestic flights between 2013 and 2016.
She raised sponsorship revenue and co-produced 26 x 30-minute episodes of Living Coffee and Mixing with the Best which are original lifestyle formats that ran on Discovery Networks across Asia, Americas, and Eastern Europe.
Susie was Senior Producer on 11 x 30-minute episodes of an international travel series called Escape produced for Lifestyle Channel and National Geographic and 13 x 30 minute episodes of Luxury Escapes for Network 7 where she co-ordinated international shoots with the management teams of leading luxury hotels across Australia, South Pacific, Asia and USA.
Susie’s passion for placemaking began with a role at Lendlease Interiors in the early 90’s and she has been the business manager on The Placemakers television series since its launch.
Christine Callinan
Christine has enjoyed a career as a Marketing Director for many of Australia’s largest developers including Lend Lease, Stockland and Grocon.
Her passion for placemaking was ignited at Lend Lease in her role as Marketing Manager for the Lend Lease Head Office – The Bond, where she was inspired to learn first-hand the significant impact placemaking has on people, brand and strategy. The project achieved many awards for sustainability, innovation, employee engagement and had a positive impact on business performance.
She went on to lead the Stockland business to envision and deliver their new head office, another award winning project and a terrific example of the important role of place making in influencing how we feel, why we behave and what we perceive.
Christine has also enjoyed a career on stage and screen as an actor, presenter and producer. Her acting credits including Crownies for ABC and A Model Daughter for Channel Ten.
After a fun foray into the acting world she made her way back to a corporate environment as the GM Marketing and Communication Pacific at CBRE for four years. In a desire to promote CBRE as thought leaders and promote the brand, she conceptualised The Placemakers TV show and collaborated with Igloo media to produce and achieve airtime on Channel Nine and Ten.
Christine has a passion for people, placemaking and developing marketing platforms that creatively and strategically build strong brand equity. As a marketing expert she understands the importance of storytelling and the role of digital in maximising the impact of the message and audience reach.
Contact the content team on info@theplacemakers.media