Draft:Claire Scorpo

Claire Scorpo is an Australian architect, founder and director of Agius Scorpo Architects. In 2014, she founded Claire Scorpo Architects. In 2018, Scorpo partnered with Nic Agius reorganizing the studio as Agius Scorpo Architects. As well as co-directing the practice, Scorpo has been leading design studios at RMIT School of Design since 2011, and is an active member of the Australian Institute of Architects and her work has been exhibited and awarded nationally.

Scorpo's work centres around offering generous high quality living spaces on a modest budget. Scorpo achieves this through thoughtful detailing, sensitive materiality selection, and the dialogue between the landscape and architecture.

Early life and family
The Scorpo family carry a long heritage of winemaking. Stretching across generations the family has grown vineyards in Sicily, Sardinia, and are currently located in Merricks North, Australia. Scorpo’s parents, Paul and Caroline Scorpo founded Scorpo Wines after purchasing an apple orchard in 1997. The property became the site of the Scorpo’s family home with their business opening in 2002. By day, Paul worked as a Landscape Architect. Running his office from home, Claire was exposed to the inner workings of a Landscape Architecture office at a young age.

Career and education
Rejecting the influence of her father's Landscape Architecture practice on her, Scorpo began her education pursuing a degree in the sciences. After enrolling in two architectural courses, Scorpo made the switch, retrospectively realizing how her father's practice has influenced how she approaches current projects.

Scorpo studied at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia graduating with a Bachelor of Architectural Design and Masters of Architecture with Distinction in 2013. During her time at RMIT Scorpo also did an exchange in Berlin, which shaped her interest in housing with small footprints which rely on public space and public amenities. In her early years at school, she took a well-known intensive studio led by Peter Corrigan. Through this connection, Scorpo was hired at Edmond and Corrigan where she worked (2006–2008) while continuing her studies part-time. While at Edmond and Corrigan Scorpo was mentored by Maggie Edmund, who was described by Neil Clerehan as "probably the nation's foremost female architect".

After finishing her thesis, Scorpo worked as a Graduate Architect at NMBW Studio (2011–2013) while continuing to finish professional courses at RMIT. At this time Scorpo began teaching design studios in residential volume building at RMIT. Her studios explore real-world social topics faced in regional towns across Victoria such as the implementation of affordable housing, mental health considerations, engaging with indigenous culture and declining populations.

One of her first projects, which was started while she was still a student was a major renovation to her parents’ home. Soon after graduation Scorpo founded her own multidisciplinary practice, Claire Scorpo Architects, in 2014. Focusing on residential renovations and add-on’s Claire Scorpo Architects was recognized within their first year of operations by winning the 2015 Architeam Award in the Residential Alterations and Additions category.

Research and gender equity
Since starting her practice in 2014, Scorpo has been dedicated to supporting women in the field of architecture. Scorpo benefited from the AIA's constructive mentoring program, having gained confidence as a woman in a male-dominated field through the mentorship of Maggie Edmond, a successful female architect herself. Scorpo credits this experience as being "enormously beneficial to me in the first year of starting practice."

Scorpo uses her practice as a research centre for developing a repeatable communal housing model which is congruent with affordable housing. She uses each project her firm takes on to progressively build towards a pilot case, which once repeatable at a low cost, she believes could provide stable housing for Australia.

In 2016, Scorpo was commissioned by the Australian design centre to create an installation for the Women in Design Symposium. In collaboration with Design Tazmania and Elliat Rich, they designed circular untreated brass components which were woven together by different groups of women at the symposium to create a suspended metallic weave. The fingerprints of each woman were left stained in the raw brass components. The project examined women’s work and what it was worth through the importance of community and working collectively.

In 2023, Scorpo partnered with sheBuilt Developers to deliver an intricate seven-storey addition at the rear of an 1880 gothic revival brick bank in South Melbourne. This project became a milestone in the Australian construction industry having been entirely facilitated by an all-female team intending to promote, empower and encourage female leadership within the building and design industry.

Awards

 * 2023 Emerging Architect Prize
 * 2022 Architeam Award Winner - Residential Alts and Adds up to $500,000 (Hawthorn I)
 * 2017 Dulux Study Tour Prize Winner
 * 2016 Houses Awards Shortlist: Emerging Architecture Practice
 * 2016 Architeam Award Commendation - Residential – Alterations (Shoreham III)
 * 2015 Architeam Award Winner - Residential Award – Alterations and Additions (Thornbury)
 * 2015 Architeam Award Commendation - Residential Award – Alterations and Additions (Fitzroy I)
 * 2015 Architeam Award Commendation - Unbuilt Award (Fitzroy II)