Twenty-five years is a long time in any industry. In architecture, it is long enough to watch cities transform, practices evolve, and entire generations of designers find their footing. For GroupGSA Director Lisa-Maree Carrigan, who joined the practice in 2001, it has been all of that and more.

Lisa-Maree Carrigan, Director at GroupGSA | Credit: GroupGSA

From her earliest days at the firm, Carrigan helped shape what GroupGSA would become: an award-winning, multidisciplinary national studio working across architecture, interior design, landscape architecture and urban design. Her influence reaches across some of the practice's most significant projects, from The Residences at Wahroonga Estate, which she led from 2015, to the Sydney Park Skate Park, Gold winner at the DRIVENxDESIGN GOV Design Awards 2021, and the Moxy Sydney Airport Hotel, recognised at the 2024 Australasia-Pacific Hotel Design Awards.

But for Carrigan, the measure of a career is not found in the awards alone.

"If we leave the practice in better shape than when we took it on, we've done our job," she says.

That philosophy has shaped how she leads. Together with Director Nancy Piazzolla, Carrigan has worked to build a workplace grounded in flexibility, inclusion and opportunity, creating visible pathways for future leaders and championing collaboration across disciplines. It is an approach that has defined GroupGSA's culture as much as any building has defined its portfolio.

A board seat before a director's chair

Carrigan's path to leadership was far from linear. Before stepping into the director role, she served as a board member at GroupGSA for 15 years, guiding the firm through major economic disruptions including the Global Financial Crisis and, later, the turbulence of COVID-19. That external vantage point gave her something few directors can claim: a deep understanding of the business of architecture before taking charge of it.

Sydney Park Skate Park designed by GroupGSA | Credit: GroupGSA

Today, GroupGSA operates across Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Ho Chi Minh City, with a portfolio that spans major urban precincts, education facilities, hospitality venues and community infrastructure. The practice's national reach reflects the vision Carrigan and her colleagues have pursued steadily over decades.

Building for the next generation

What separates Carrigan's approach to leadership from the purely transactional is her focus on succession. The question she keeps returning to is not what has been built, but who will build next, and whether the conditions are in place for them to do it well.

"Success isn't measured only by the buildings we deliver," she says, "but by the practice we leave for the next generation."

In 25 years, GroupGSA has grown from a single Sydney studio into a national multidisciplinary practice with an international presence. That growth did not happen by accident. It happened because people like Carrigan chose to invest not just in projects, but in the people who deliver them.

That is, perhaps, the most enduring form of architecture.

Architecture & Design Team

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