Women in architecture: Kitty Fan

Born in Taiwan, Kitty was an only child for the first 12 years of her life until her brother came along, and drawing had always been her form of entertainment.

“I had a lot of cousins that I’d hang out with and we were all reasonably good at hand-eye coordination and were slightly competitive – when we were drawing we’d try to one up the other person. There wasn’t really much else to entertain us,” she shares.

Later in life at the career counsellor's office, it was suggested that Kitty go down the track of industrial design. However, at the time, there wasn’t a Bachelor’s degree offered in the field – leading her to architecture school instead.

“It was a five-year degree – two Bachelors, one after the other. It was a long degree, and I think I had a lot of growing up to do even while I was still at university. I wasn’t the best student, I was probably a bit distracted,” laughs Kitty. “But in the final year, I realised that I needed to get my act together and once I did it was so good.”

As a student, Kitty worked as an office junior at a commercial practice, and after graduation decided she wanted to experience working at a smaller boutique practice.

“And that’s what I did. I went to work for a practice in Ponsonby who worked on high-end residential projects. I got registered, and then the GFC hit, so I went to Melbourne to work for two years.”

With over 15 years of experience in the industry, Kitty has been part of many projects that she looks back on fondly, but her time in Melbourne was a definite highlight.

“I think when you’re a young person in the architectural community in New Zealand, you have a lot of self-doubt about whether you’re good enough, whether you’ve put in enough work, or whether or not you deserve a place in this community or in this profession,” says Kitty.

“I’m not sure if other people feel this about their OEs, but I think my experience in Melbourne not only gave me a lot of experience that would otherwise be relatively hard to come by for a person of that experience level, but it also made me realise that opportunities are available to you because of the size of the economy.”

Kitty explains that when she was in Australia, a lot of government projects were underway to stimulate the economy – providing her with her first opportunity to be a project architect for a significant project.

“I started to realise that I could actually do this job. Once you have that exposure, then you realise that, actually, you’ve been good enough all along – it’s just that the opportunity hadn’t come along yet. It allows you to then craft your career in terms of what you want and what you know you’re capable of achieving.”

This can look like many things for different people, and while a dedicated corporate career path is often a “traditional” way of defining success as an architect, Kitty doesn’t believe that this is the only definition. To help young people in the industry also come to realise this, Kitty is proud to work with Architecture+Women NZ when she isn’t busy bringing projects to life as a senior associate at Architectus, or devoting time to her two children.

“It’s quite restorative and brings me a lot of energy to be involved with Architecture+Women,” she says, and every year is involved with organising the non-profit’s Speed Mentoring event.

Held in a speed-dating format, the event provides the opportunity for people at various stages in their architectural career to engage in fast-paced, informal conversations with others in the field.

“It’s something fun and I think it’s really important to build vertical networks. When you start working, you know the people in your practice, but you don’t necessarily know people from other practices – it’s reasonably hard for someone junior to have access to a senior from a different practice.

“So, I’m quite passionate about the speed mentoring because it provides opportunities to build these points of connection. You can hear from and ask advice from people who you look up to, and who are leaders in the industry.

“There are so many ways to be successful in the industry and you’ve really got to define for yourself what success means. My involvement with Architecture+Women has helped me define my own terms of success.”

Words by Cassie Birrer