Professor Nicole Kalms awarded $712,282 ARC grant for inclusive public toilet design

Professor Nicole Kalms from Monash Art, Design and Architecture (MADA) has been awarded a prestigious 2026 Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Project Grant valued at $712,282. Professor Kalms leads the project and will be collaborating with Professor Emily Potter from Deakin University.

The research project, titled “Designing Dignity: Civic equity through public bathroom architecture” aims to transform one of Australia’s most overlooked yet essential public amenities — the public toilet — into an inclusive, multipurpose space that reflects the nation’s diverse social and cultural values.

The Australian public bathroom provision, once a celebrated public health initiative that promoted civility and mobility, is in disrepair and rapid decline. There is a shift towards a reliance on the public sector where toilets are sequestered in shopping centres, cafes, and commercial spaces. This negatively impacts the lives of vulnerable populations – such as the disabled, elderly, the homeless and women –creating inequity of access, limiting individual mobility, affecting their health and wellbeing, and social cohesion.

Professor Kalms explained,

“By adopting a place-based and codesigned approach across different cities, suburbs and regions, the project findings will serve as a blueprint for individuals, communities, practitioners and governments to ensure that public bathrooms are valued civic assets which promote diverse and equitable communities.”

The project extends beyond sanitation to consider how designing amenities for breastfeeding, menstruation, and incontinence care, as well as addressing the needs of carers and people experiencing homelessness can shape public amenity. It will also consider faith-based rituals, hygiene requirements for people in transit, and the increasing pressures caused by overcrowded or unsafe domestic environments.

Through new frameworks and speculative design practices, the project will provide guidance for policymakers, architects, and urban designers seeking to create more inclusive and responsive public infrastructure.

The ARC Discovery Project scheme supports high-quality research that expands Australia’s knowledge base and fosters collaboration between leading scholars. This award highlights MADA’s leadership in design innovation and socially responsive urban research that shapes more inclusive futures for Australian cities.

MADA researchers were also part of teams led by other Monash faculties and universities that were awarded in this round of Discovery Projects.

Associate Professor Shanti Sumartojo, Processor Lisa Grocott and Dr Ilya Fridman are part of a project team awarded $796,732, led by Professor Stacey Holman Jones of the Faculty of Arts at Monash University. This project will co-create innovative participatory methods that harness imagination and collaboration to help governments, businesses, and communities anticipate, adapt to, and act on uncertain and contested climate futures.

Desiree Hernandez Ibinarriaga is part of a University of Sydney research team led by Dr Anusha Withanage Don that has received a $954,679 grant to develop a computational framework for scalable, sustainable manufacturing using living fungi-based materials.