What - if anything - do you remember from the night you won PPA Editor of the Year?

I remember thinking ‘Time to leave. What’s next?’ The AJ had had an incredible year. It was one of those rare moments in a magazine’s lifetime when the stars are all aligned. I had a brilliant team including the talented young art editor, Sarah Douglas, who is now Editor of Wallpaper*. Just as importantly, we had a fantastically ambitious publisher – Jonathan Stock, now Publishing Director of Architecture Today – who never doubted that the AJ’s potential to be redesigned and reinvented as the most exciting mag around.

That year we won a whole raft of awards for different aspects of the magazine – design, online, photography, editorial. I knew at that point that I’d achieved everything I wanted to in that particular job. I left publishing altogether and have only just come back. I’ve now co-founded Citizen magazine with Will Hunter, Director of the London School of Architecture – who was my intern on the AJ when we had our winning streak.

What was your favourite single front cover during your time as Editor and why?

Our 40 under 40 cover is the one that best encapsulates what we were trying to do. One of the challenges I inherited as editor was an old and ageing readership. We reinvented the magazine with the express aim of building loyalty amongst a new generation of architects. And launched an exhibition of the UK’s most exciting architects under 40 at the V&A to accompany the relaunch.

Looking back as a PPA award-winning Editor, what advice would you now give yourself when you were starting out in our industry?

Make the magazine you’d want to read. I know it goes against all perceived wisdom about the importance of market research and knowing your reader but it’s the only thing that’s ever worked for me.