Chris Williamson is the founder of one of the UK’s best known architectural practices, Weston Williamson + Partners. Formed with fellow Leicester Polytechnic student Andrew Weston (the pair were told to work together in the design studio because their surnames were alphabetically adjacent in the register), the practice is best known for its transport infrastructure projects, including the Paddington and Woolwich stations on the Elizabeth Line.

‘You can work with Weston,’ they said to us at Leicester,” says Williamson. “And, 40 years later, we’re still working together.

“The reason we clicked was because we had compatible interests. That included a shared concern about sustainability – even at the end of the 1970s, climate change was an issue.”

Having sold the practice to Egis Group in 2022, Williamson went from being a practice owner to being an employee again. Motivated by a desire to ensure RIBA gives a new generation of architects the support he feels it gave his practice at a crucial moment in the 1980s, Williamson is running to be RIBA president from 2025-27.

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