In 2017 Lucy joined Manchester School of Architecture as Senior Lecturer with the remit to expand connections between industry and academia. Her research focuses on the relationship between theory and praxis in the built environment, the use of tacit knowledge in the design process and practice-based/design-led research methodologies. She is the Programme Director of the MA Architecture & Urbanism.

Lucy is currently writing a monograph for Routledge, co-authored with David Rudlin, exploring how paradigms in the field of urban design have developed through drawing. Having spent the last decade working internationally on methodological approaches to integrate practice within research processes and criteria, Lucy is also lead the strategic creation of an MSA model for practice-based research and managed the School’s practice-based research outputs for REF2021.

In 2019, Lucy established an innovative model for collaboration, with world-renowned industry partner URBED and the School of Architecture forming URBED+ as a vehicle for research, advocacy, education and public engagement in urban issues. Their projects cover a wide range of urban issues from housing and neighbourhood scale retrofit, to planning policy and the community participation, attracting funding and collaboration from public and provate sector partners as well as research councils. Along with URBED+ researchers Vicky Payne and David Rudlin, Lucy is currently writing a book on the future of the high street for RIBA Publishing, funded by the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1951’s Built Environment Fellowship.

Lucy has previously held a Senior Lectureship at The University of Huddersfield and a Teaching Fellowship with Professor Matthew Carmona at the Bartlett School of Planning, leading the MRes in Interdisciplinary Urban Design. She has tutored architecture and urban design at Edinburgh College of Art and Edinburgh School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture. In 2013 she completed her PhD in Edinburgh. She has worked for architectural firms in London and Melbourne as well as freelance, on a wide variety of projects in terms of scale and covering retail, residential, regeneration and masterplanning.

Academic and professional qualifications

FHEA Postgraduate Certificate in Teaching & Learning in Higher & Professional Education (The Institure of Education)
PhD (Edinburgh College of Art, The University of Edinburgh)
MSc Urban Design with distinction (Edinburgh College of Art, The University of Edinburgh)
PG Dip Architecture & Urbanism with distinction ARB Part II (Edinburgh College of Art, The University of Edinburgh)
BArch (Hons) 1st Class ARB Part I (Edinburgh College of Art, Heriot Watt University)

Academic service (administration and management)

Programme Director of the MA Architecture & Urbanism

Founder and Academic Lead of URBED+

Postgraduate teaching

MA Architecture & Urbanism

Postgraduate supervision

PhD candidate Hannah Dixon: Retrofit at an Urban Scale

Research

Books

Montague, L.M., Rudlin, D., 2025. 'Desire Lines: How the way we draw affects the cities we build', Routledge, New York.

RUDLIN D., PAYNE, V., MONTAGUE, L., , 2023. 'HIGH STREET How Our Town Centres Can Bounce Back from the Retail Crisis', RIBA Publishing.

Book Chapters

Montague, L.M., 2016. 'Theory's Role in Placelessness'. In Freestone, R., Liu, E. (eds.) Place and Placelessness Revisited, pp. 49-60, Routledge, New York.

Reports

Montague, L.M., 2014. 'Review of the Master of Urban Design, RMIT Melbourne'.

Montague, L.M., Forsyth, W.L., Fraser, D., 2011. 'Review of the Scottish Government's Charette Mainstreaming Programme: Johnstone South-West'.

Non-Peer Reviewed Articles

Montague, L.M., 2017. 'Square Pegs and Round Holes: Integrating the unpredictability of community engagement with the slow-moving machine of academia', The Academy of Urbanism Journal.

Conference Papers

Montague, L.M., 2016. 'Representational Practices in Urban Design', Eleventh International Conference on Design Principles & Practices, George Brown College, Toronto Canada, 2/3/2017 - 4/3/2017.

Montague, L.M., Powell, A., Swindells, S., 2015. 'Cultural Economics: Relating Urban Design, Art and Civic Society as a Platform for Creative Consultation', 2nd International Conference on "Changing Cities II: spatial, design, landscape & socio-economic dimensions, Porto Heli, Greece, 22/6/2015 - 26/6/2015, in Proceedings of the International Conference on Changing Cities II: Spatial, Design, Landscape & Socio?economic dimensions.

Montague, L.M., 2015. 'Designing the Urban: Reflections on the role of theory in the individual design process', Fourth International Conference on Architectural Research by Design, Lusofona University, Lisbon, 8/5/2014 - 9/5/2014.

Montague, L.M., Powell, A., Swindells, S., 2015. 'Exploring Place and Public Memory: Huddersfield and the Regional North', Contemphoto '15: Urban Identities, 2nd International Contemporary Photography Conference, Istanbul, Turkey, 9/6/2015 - 10/6/2015, in Contemphoto '15: Urban Identities.

Montague, L.M., Powell, A., Swindells, S., 2015. 'The Civic Role of the University in Post-Industrial Towns: Public Memory, Urban Identities and Creative Consultation', The Urban University Conference: Universities as place makers and agents of civic success, The Collaborative Centre for the Built Environment (CCBE), The University of Northampton, Northampton, 2/7/2015 - 3/7/2015.

Montague, L.M., 2013. 'Reflective Practice in Urban Design', Knowing (by) Designing, Brussels, Belgium, 22/5/2013 - 23/5/2013, in LUCA Departement Architectuur Sint-Lucas.