Jane Cady Rathbone Design Retreat
Named for our board chair and CEO emeritus, Jane Cady Rathbone, the Design Retreat is an annual, faculty-led experience grounded in the belief that to create great design, one must first experience it. The retreat brings practitioners together to engage architecture, culture, and place through travel, observation, and dialogue.
Open to employees across the firm, the retreat supports a shared investment in learning, strengthening design thinking, expanding perspective, and reinforcing a culture of curiosity and collaboration.
Each year, participants step away from daily practice to immerse themselves in the built environment, returning with new insights that continue to shape the firm’s evolving approach to design.
Travel has long been central to how architects learn. Across cultures and generations, designers have looked beyond their immediate context to understand how buildings, landscapes, and cities take shape, and how design responds to social, environmental, and cultural forces.
At Hanbury, this tradition continues through shared experience, creating space to observe, reflect, and ask better questions. Over time, design excellence is shaped through curiosity, exposure, and a growing awareness of how ideas translate across place and practice.
Through site visits, walking tours, lectures, and dialogue, participants engage contemporary, vernacular, and historic works of architecture. Sketching, photography, and conversation become tools for understanding, not only what is built, but why.
The experience is immersive and collaborative, balancing individual reflection with shared discovery. Time spent moving through cities, revisiting sites, and discussing observations allows ideas to take shape gradually, developing as much by conversation as by the work itself.
For many, the retreat is a moment of renewal, an opportunity to reconnect with the curiosity that first drew them to design. Participants return with expanded references, new ways of seeing the world, and a deeper awareness of how design operates across different contexts.
These insights extend beyond the individual, contributing to an ongoing dialogue that continues to shape the firm’s design culture. Over time, this shared knowledge becomes part of how the firm approaches its work.
The Design Retreat has taken participants to diverse locations across the globe, each offering a distinct lens through which to study design. From historic centers to contemporary works, each setting provides an opportunity to experience architecture within its cultural and physical context.
Switzerland • Japan • Brazil • Egypt • Spain • Portugal • England • Scandinavia • Cuba • Chicago • Denmark • Sweden • Prague
Each destination builds on a growing body of shared experience, expanding the firm’s collective understanding of architecture, culture, and place.
The retreat is part of an ongoing exchange of ideas within the firm. Participants return to share observations and insights, contributing to a broader dialogue that informs design thinking across studios and project types.
In this way, the retreat extends beyond the experience itself, strengthening a shared culture of learning and supporting a thoughtful, research-driven approach to practice.
Travel and exposure to a broad range of architecture reminds us that we are always students, constantly asking how we can grow through design.
