Photo courtesy Kelly Nelson Doran

Kelly Nelson Doran, winner of the Canada Council for the Arts' Prix de Rome in Architecture for Emerging Practitioners. Doran's interest in northern communities extends beyond his professional life–he currently lives above the Arctic Circle in Tromsø, Norway.

Kelly Nelson Doran, an architect researching sustainable design in northern industrial communities, has been awarded the Canada Council for the Arts' Prix de Rome in Architecture for Emerging Practitioners.

Bestowed on a recent graduate of one of the country's 10 accredited architecture schools, the $34,000 prize provides an opportunity to visit buildings abroad and intern at firms of international stature.

Over the next year, Doran will continue his research on resource development companies' impact on northern landscape, infrastructure, and urbanism. He is travelling to industrial communities in Iceland, Norway, Sweden, and Finland to study their economic structure and how they incorporate various elements of sustainable development that could enhance Canadian regional planning practices.

Doran, who was born in Winnipeg, has degrees from the University of Manitoba and the University of Toronto. He was selected by an assessment committee consisting of architects from across the country. Doran's previous honours include Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC) Medal, the Irving Grossman Prize, and the 2007 Cohos Evamy Travelling Scholarship (which funded his research visits to northern Alberta and the Northwest Territories).

The Prix de Rome has also paved the way for Doran to intern with 70ºN Arkitektur AS, working on the sustainable redevelopment of a former docklands in Copenhagen, Denmark.