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ProfessorRichard Tucker

Professor

Faculty of Science Engineering and Built Environment/School of Architecture and Built Environment/HOME

Orcid identifier0000-0001-9989-251X (opens in a new tab)⁠
  • Professor
    Faculty of Science Engineering and Built Environment/School of Architecture and Built Environment/HOME
  • +61 3 522 78308 (Work)
  • Geelong Waterfront Campus, 1 Gheringhap Street Geelong, Victoria 3220

RESEARCH INTERESTS

Foremost among my current research activities is my work as the Co-Leader of HOME. HOME is an interdisciplinary group of around 30 Deakin researchers, with expertise across design, architecture, health, homelessness, disability, accessibility and universal design, indigenous communities, human geography, place-making, anthropology, systems thinking, community engagement, the arts, policy, law, property, and economics. We partner with communities, not-for-profits, business, and government to solve complex problems around affordable housing, homelessness, and social inclusion, and use action research, informed by systems and design thinking, to develop strategies that are community-tailored, evidence-based, and place-focused. I strongly recommend you explore this work further via the HOME website (link in sidebar).

On a more personal level, through sustained evidence-based innovation and research, I have become an internationally recognised specialist in the in the fields of housing research and the pedagogy of architectural design and related contexts. I have formed research teams with over 100 colleagues from seven academic institutions and around 30 industry partners, collaborating on projects externally funded for over $3M. Over the last 22 years, I have published over 130 peer reviewed publications on sustainable, universal, urban, and housing design, on accessibility and inclusivity in built environment design, and on design education, including: 6 books, 17 book chapters, and 60 journal papers.

GRANTS

  • INTERNAL GRANT
    Intergenerational Housing as Urban Care Infrastructure: An Australian Nationwide Expert Survey
    SEBE PRESS 2026; HOME SRIC (Project Development Grants)12 Mar 2026
    People funded by this grant:
  • INTERNAL GRANT
    Connecting to Home: Designing Integrated Health and Knowledge-Sharing Systems for Regional Homelessness Services (opens in a new tab)⁠
    Deakin Science and Society Network2 Mar 2026 - 31 Dec 2026
    People funded by this grant:
    PROJECT TEAM: This project is led by Drs Akari Nakai Kidd and David Boarder Giles, Senior Lecturers at Deakin in Architecture and Anthropology, respectively, based in the Schools of Architecture and Built Environment, and Humanities and Social Sciences. Drs Kidd and Giles are members of Deakin’s HOME SRIC, and have recently completed a HOME-based research project entitled “Home Truths: Local insights into homelessness”, on which this project builds. They are joined on this project by several colleagues in HOME including: Associate Professor Ameeta Jain in the School of Finance; Associate Professor and HOME co-director Fiona Andrews and Professor Genevieve Pippin, of the School of Health and Social Development; and Professor and HOME co-director Richard Tucker, of the School of Architecture and Built Environment. Together, the team brings together a rich spectrum of expertise regarding housing systems, health outcomes, socioeconomic vulnerability, and co-design methodologies-particularly Systems Thinking in Community Knowledge Exchange (STICKE) which this project employs, and with which the team has a wealth of collective experience. PROJECT DESCRIPTION: While the negative health effects of homelessness are widely studied, far less understood are the health implications, for People Experiencing Homelessness (PEH), of the complex ecosystem of Specialised Homelessness Services (SHS) and related supports. This project investigates a critical, understudied aspect of that system: its informational infrastructures. We build on findings and community partnerships developed through pilot research with SHS providers and PEH in Greater Geelong (Giles, Nakai Kidd, et al., 2025), suggesting that barriers, bottlenecks, and redundancies in information circulation and knowledge-sharing represent systemic impediments to effective service delivery and client outcomes-with health implications including delayed care, treatment discontinuity, service fatigue, and mental distress. Through cross-disciplinary collaboration and community partnerships, this project will explore information pathways within the ecosystem and suggest interventions for the wellbeing of PEH.
    MORELEARN MORE (opens in a new tab)
  • CONTRACT RESEARCH
    Building Stronger Communities: Evaluating the Social Outcomes of the SSC Grant Program
    30 Jun 2025 - 30 Jun 2026
    People funded by this grant:
    Australian Neighbourhood Houses & Centres Association - $50,000.00
  • CONTRACT RESEARCH
    Colac Otway Adaptable Precincts: a blueprint for future housing delivery
    1 Jun 2025 - 31 Mar 2027
    People funded by this grant:
    Colac-Otway Shire Council - $484,333.00
  • INTERNAL GRANT
    Research Impact Criteria in Built Environment and Design Disciplines: An Australian e-Delphi Study
    School of Architecture and Built Environment (2025 and 2026 Stream 1 )11 Apr 2025
    People funded by this grant:
  • INTERNAL GRANT
    Health-Promoting Design of Residential Care Facilities: Enhancing Nature Connection to Influence Modifiable Risk Factors Associated with Depression
    2025 Peer-reviewed ECR Support Scheme (PRESS)1 Jan 2025
    People funded by this grant:
  • CONTRACT RESEARCH
    Home Truths: Local Insights into Homelessness
    21 Oct 2024 - 1 Feb 2025
    People funded by this grant:
    Give Where You Live Gift - GF00682 - $35,000.00
  • INTERNAL GRANT
    Identifying Opportunities and Barriers to Innovation in Residential Aged Care Building Design: An Australian e-Delphi Study
    2024 Peer-reviewed ECR Support Scheme (PRESS), and HOME SRIC SEED Funding Scheme22 Feb 2024 - 31 Dec 2024
    People funded by this grant:
  • GRANT
    Architecture of Compassion
    1 Jan 2024 - 31 Dec 2026
    People funded by this grant:
    Australian Health Design Council - Research Scholarship - 94 786 233 514 - $15,000.00
  • CONTRACT RESEARCH
    SASI Safe2Go DriverAssist
    3 Jul 2023 - 3 Jul 2026
    People funded by this grant:
    Alstom Transport Australia - $1,975,112.27
  • GRANT
    Future proofing guiding principles in the context of hospital building design.
    12 Sep 2022 - 16 Dec 2022
    People funded by this grant:
    • Tucker R,
    • Memari S
    International Education Resilience Fund - $9,000.00
  • CONTRACT RESEARCH
    Vital Communities: Addressing social disadvantage Project: developing recommendations for medium and long-term strategic approaches and policy needs
    30 Nov 2020 - 30 Apr 2021
    People funded by this grant:
    City of Greater Geelong - $49,500.00
  • CONTRACT RESEARCH
    Family and child friendly design: Stage 2
    3 Mar 2020 - 26 Jun 2020
    People funded by this grant:
    Department of Environment Land Water and Planning - $48,271.82
  • GRANT
    Homes for 'Grey Nesters': Social integration of a micro-village of small houses supporting community wellbeing in Geelong
    13 May 2019 - 16 Jul 2021
    People funded by this grant:
    Geelong Community Foundation Grant - Research - ABN 41659735441 - $40,000.00
  • GRANT
    Micro-village Phase 1
    25 Mar 2019 - 9 Dec 2022
    People funded by this grant:
    Lord Mayor's Charitable Foundation - General Grants - $50,000.00
  • GRANT
    Architecture with feeling: Measuring emotional response to the built environment
    15 Nov 2018 - 30 Nov 2019
    People funded by this grant:
    Creative Futures Pty Ltd - $5,000.00
  • CONTRACT RESEARCH
    Accessible & Inclusive Geelong Feasibility Study.
    1 Oct 2018 - 30 Aug 2019
    People funded by this grant:
    • Richard Tucker
    Department of Health and Human Services - Victoria - $250,000.00
  • CONTRACT RESEARCH
    Co-Designed Housing for People with Intellectual Disability: Literature Review.
    1 Oct 2018 - 31 Jan 2019
    People funded by this grant:
    • Richard Tucker
    The Consumer Policy Research Centre - $25,000.00
  • GRANT
    Towards Zero Carbon Housing in Victoria
    2 Aug 2018 - 1 Jul 2020
    People funded by this grant:
    Department of Environment Land Water and Planning - GA-F9044-4214 - $50,000.00
  • GRANT
    Evaluating architecture induced emotion through observing and measuring correlates of affective response too enclosed built environments of different scale
    1 Aug 2018 - 1 Aug 2020
    People funded by this grant:
    The Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture - John Paul Eberhard Fellowship - $11,417.82
  • COMPETITIVE GRANT
    Creativity and Innovation Grant
    Creative Futures Pty. Ltd.1 Jan 2018 - 31 Dec 2018
    People funded by this grant:
  • PRIZE / AWARD
    John Paul Eberhard Fellowship
    Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture1 Jan 2018 - 31 Dec 2022
    People funded by this grant:
  • INTERNAL GRANT
    Using the Integrated Sustainable Design and Construction (ISDC) framework to improve community development in rural areas: Ampara, Sri Lanka
    1 Mar 2017 - 30 Nov 2017
    People funded by this grant:
  • GRANT
    Developing pedagogical solutions to linguistic and cultural barriers in design education supporting Asian architecture students
    21 Dec 2015 - 1 Apr 2018
    People funded by this grant:
    • Gu N,
    • Lee JH,
    • Ostwald M,
    • Taylor M,
    • Burry J
    OLT Innovation and Development Grants - Office for Learning and Teaching - ID15-4651 - $3,000.00
  • GRANT
    Re-Casting terra nullius blindness: Empowering Indigenous Protocols and Knowledge in Australian University Built Environment Education
    12 Dec 2012 - 31 Dec 2017
    People funded by this grant:
    • Jones D,
    • Tucker R
    OLT Seed Projects - Office for Learning and Teaching - ID12-2418 - $220,000.00