PORTFOLIO
I'm Katie, an urban planner and writer specialised in the link between cities and health. I blend narrative-driven “new journalism” with serious, factual reporting to tell human stories about the political-economic forces shaping contemporary places. I work between London and New York.
I’m the Director of Research and Urban Health at Future Places Studio and a PhD researcher in urban planning at the London School of Economics. My first book, The Expressway, is forthcoming with Verso.
My writing and journalism have appeared in the likes of Next City, Aeon / Longreads, Vittles, The BREAK—DOWN, FairPlanet and some industry publications like The Planner, Progressing Planning and Urban Democracy Lab. I’ve contributed to research published by New London Architecture, the Town and Country Planning Association and U.S. Human Rights Network.
Photo by Frida Abildgaard
Selected Work
Media and highlights
WRITING. RESEARCH. CONSULTING.
project. 
Economy, Skills and Culture Committee at the London Assembly,
2 June 2026
Invited to present evidence about the pedestrianisation of Oxford Street and its knock-on impacts for the uptake of Healthy Streets approaches city-wide.
Coverage of 15-minute city debate in Canada’s National Observer,
16 June 2026
Interviewed to comment on polarisation in planning, following my 2025 Next City piece on the topic.
Future Places Studio presents at Healthy City Design congress,
October 2025
Launched Future Places Studio and Okana's latest report, Health as a Place's Competitive Advantage, at the SALUS Global Knowledge Exchange Healthy City Design congress in Greater Manchester.
“Sick City,”
Aeon Magazine
“A beautifully expressed meditation on the relationship between planning and health, and a fine example of using narrative to tell the story of planning. A must read.” - The Planner, Royal Town Planning Institute Member Magazine (2024)
Also selected as a Longreads pick andnamed under Best History Writing of 2023 by Bunk History
“Home Sick,”
The Planner, Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI) Magazine
“We love featuring long-from articles by planners in the magazine and we enjoy working with industry professionals to produce high quality material that sits comfortably in our pages. It's rare, however, to come across a planning professional whose work is so good that it could happily grace the pages of the New Yorker or a magazine of similar standing.
As soon as we read a piece by Katie Mulkowsky, we knew we had to have her in The Planner. This, we hope, is the first of many articles that explore her interest in and concern for the intersection of planning, housing and health. It's beautifully written and manages to balance the personal, the public and the professional with a deceptively light touch." - The Planner (2025)
