Rate My Professor Michaela Prescott

Dr. Michaela Prescott is a landscape architect and senior research fellow in the Informal Cities Lab at Monash University’s Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture, Department of Architecture, where she also serves as a senior lecturer. She earned her Doctor of Science in Architecture from ETH Zurich in 2017, with a doctoral thesis entitled 'Village in the River: transformation of riverine landscapes in vernacular urban settlements in Jakarta, Indonesia.' Prior degrees include a Master of Landscape Architecture with Distinction from RMIT University in 2011 and a Bachelor of Design in Landscape Architecture with Distinction from RMIT University in 2008. Prescott’s professional career encompasses practice and academia across multiple countries. Between 2012 and 2017, based in Singapore, she participated in the interdisciplinary Landscape Ecology Ciliwung Project at the Singapore-ETH Centre, worked as a landscape architect at HASSELL Singapore, and completed her doctorate. She has engaged in private and commercial landscape architecture practice in Australia, Singapore, and the Netherlands, as well as municipal landscape design and urban strategic planning in Melbourne. Formerly a lecturer at RMIT University, she currently teaches design studios at Monash and RMIT universities and has been an invited design critic and guest lecturer at ETH Zurich, University of Technology Sydney, and National University of Singapore Landscape Architecture programs. She was an invited speaker at the 2020 Australian Institute of Landscape Architects Land-E-Scape conference.

Prescott’s practice-based research examines the urbanisation of water and river systems, the impacts of infrastructure on neighbourhoods and communities, and the delivery and sustainability of community-based projects, with a focus on socio-cultural dimensions of landscapes, living environments, infrastructure, and urbanisation. She contributes to funded projects such as Revitalising Informal Settlements and their Environments (RISE), Water for Women: Toolkit for the gender responsive co-design of WASH facilities, and Citarum Action Research Program. Her scholarly output includes influential publications like 'Understanding the value of urban riparian corridors: considerations in planning for cultural services along an Indonesian river' (Landscape and Urban Planning, 2015), 'Mapping an alternative community river: The case of the Ciliwung' (Sustainable Cities and Society, 2016), 'Green infrastructure for sanitation in settlements in the global south: A narrative review of socio-technical systems' (Sustainability, 2021), and recent works such as 'Citarum Living Lab: Co-creating visions for sustainable river revitalisation' (PLOS Water, 2024) and 'Transformative principles for circular economy transitions in the Global South' (npj Urban Sustainability, 2025). The RISE Demonstration Site was shortlisted for the ArchitectureAU Award for Social Impact in 2023. Prescott undertakes peer review for journals including Environment and Planning F and Journal of Asian Architecture and Building Engineering, and for the Australian Research Council, supervises graduate research, and supports UN Sustainable Development Goals related to health, education, gender equality, water, cities, and climate action.