Our Team

Director & Architect

Justin has a background in animating large architectural projects in Australia, including the MCG and Southern Cross Station. Justin was an early adopter of Revit and BIM in 2004 and consulted with Autodesk on developing BIM projects over the years.

Justin founded Ardent Architects 10 years ago and quickly gained national clients such as Nissan, Priceline, Coles and Reece, helping them deliver projects and develop their in-house BIM skills.

He has stayed at the forefront of technology in Architecture to help deliver innovative solutions for clients. Ardent were early adopters of in-house 3D point cloud and drone point cloud scanning.  His design work has won numerous awards over his career in diverse areas, from heritage renovation to commercial design.

His varied and interesting experience has created a skill set capable of designing and managing projects over $20M while still being able to focus on project delivery that exceeds the client’s expectations.

Justin worked extensively with the Department of Sustainability and the Environment (DSE).

Senior Architect

Education and Government Lead

Neil has over twenty years of experience working in architecture working on projects in Victoria, New South Wales, ACT and Queensland.

He has significant experience working on government (both local and state) projects helping deliver projects such as new facilities for Victoria State Emergency Service, sports stadiums, community centres and a range of projects for state schools for the VSBA and Department of Education.

 Neil also has experience working and helping deliver a range of commercial projects. These projects include office fitouts and car dealerships, as well as delivery of Car Parking Standards for Coles.

 He is also involved in local community activities, holding committee positions for both the Hobsons Bay Toy Library and the Friends of Newport Lakes. He has been a junior football coach for the local football club for four years.

Senior Architect

Residential Lead

Natasha is the heart of our residential projects at Ardent, working with clients from concept through to handover. She provides unparalleled support to clients during all stages, from ensuring their design is realised during concept, to helping select fixtures, and to getting on site to check construction progress. Natasha a keen eye for detail and specialises in delivering residential projects that surpass expectations as well as overcoming hurdles from the concept stage through to completion with a minimum of fuss.

Natasha has completed many projects over her career including extensions and new homes up to $9m.

Natasha’s skill set includes detailed design development and leading documentation teams as well as project administration and contract administration.

Natasha’s level-headed approach and with her extensive experience, including dealing with tradespeople ensures any project she is involved with is completed on time, within budget, and with the least amount of hassles.

Project Coordinator

Commercial Lead and Consulting Support Specialist

Michael started his architecture career doing residential design for a small local construction company. Later he was nominated Brian Morrison Award for the BDAV in 2015 and was interning at Niche Media for a magazine well-regarded for Interior Design known as IDEA.

When Michael joined Ardent Architects, he worked with brands such as Priceline, Magic Hand Carwash & Coles.

Notable Michael's first project received the Excellence in Building and Construction Award in Darwin for Top End Medical Centre. During the past years at Ardent, he has worked as a project leader and Senior Project Administrator.

Project Administrator

Technical Administrator

Richard started his career at architecture practice, where he met Justin. When Justin founded Ardent Architects in 2010, Richard was one of its first team members to join.  Since then, Richard has worked on a range of projects, various Corporate Identity rollouts (Nissan, Priceline) one off commercial builds (e.g. car dealerships).  Over time his primary focus has shifted to supporting the Coles Supermarkets standards team and along with other Coles departments.  Provides BIM support across all projects within the office.

Architect

Commercial Lead and Consulting Support Specialist

Michael joined Ardent as a graduate and since then has been fortunate to work on a wide variety of projects from retail fitouts to multi-residential. Primarily he has worked on residential renovations and custom homes, taking the projects from sketch design through town planning and on to construction. The experience gained at Ardent Architects allowed him to successfully pass the architect’s registration exam and become a registered architect.

 Since the start of 2022, Michael has taken on the role of working with the Coles Supermarkets Store standards team to support the release of their Blueprint stores and provide design advice. 

Senior Project Administrator

Architect and Urban Designer with over 20 years of work experience focused on design and documentation with major exposure to high & medium-density residential, mixed-use, and commercial developments.

Luiz has worked in all stages of architectural projects ranging from custom-designed homes, townhouses & multi-unit developments, mid & low-rise apartments/mixed-use buildings and commercial developments such as childcare centres, aged care facilities, retirement communities and most recently, industrial buildings and estates.

A broad exposure to architecture combined with an attentive personality allowed him to develop a deep understanding of building processes and good skills in design, documentation, and project coordination.

Architectural Graduate

After graduating from her first University, Sofija worked as a lecturer at Baltic International Academy (Riga, Latvia) for two years. At the same time, she was creating cartoons in the animation studio “Urga”. Sofija worked in Design companies as a Graphic designer for over 5 years.

After moving to Australia as a new start, she joined the architectural Industry to pursue and continue developing herself in that field.

Practice Manager

Leigh grew up and started my working journey in Zimbabwe.  She then moved to the UK for 15 years, where I worked in numerous jobs, from bar service to heading up the commercial billing department at Sky Television.  Her background is in billing. She loved the data analysis and problem-solving/system implementation of complex commercial contracts. 

Leigh moved to Australia approx. 16 years ago and has enjoyed working for small to medium businesses and being involved in all aspects of the business, from running the office to looking after the books.

Office Manager