School of Architecture, Design and Planning

Dr Deborah van der Plaat

View researcher profile

Researcher biography

Deborah van der Plaat is a Senior Research Fellow with the School of Architecture, The University of Queensland. She was formerly a Senior Research Fellow and Manager of the Architecture Theory Criticism History Research Centre (ATCH), UQ (2015-2019). Her research examines the architecture of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and its intersection with theories of artistic agency, climate, environment and race. Writing histories of Queensland architecture is also a focus within her work and, with John Macarthur, she continues to develop and expand the Digital Archive of Queensland Architecture (DAQA, launched in 2014, https://qldarch.net/)

Her most research outputs include:

  • [edited book] Karl Langer: Modern Architect and Migrant in Tropical Australia (with John Macarthur, London: Bloomsbury, 2022), https://www.bloomsbury.com/au/karl-langer-9781350068117/
  • [edited book] Light, Space, Place: the architecture of Robin Gibson (with Lloyd Jones, Melbourne: URO Publications, 2022), https://uropublications.com/collections/books-from-uro-publications/products/light-space-place-architecture-robin-gibson
  • [book chapter] "Casting Shadows and Seeking Shade," with Nicole Sully in Ryan, Daniel J., Ferng, Jennifer and L'Heureux, Erik G. Drawing Climate: Visualising Invisible Elements of Architecture. Berlin, Boston: Birkhäuser, 2022, pp. 120-149, https://doi.org/10.1515/9783035623611
  • [book chapter] "Wireless Architecture: Robert Percy Cummings Early Radio Talks," with John Macarthur in E. Couchez, & Heynickx, R. (Eds.). Architectural Education Through Materiality: Pedagogies of 20th Century Design (1st ed.) London: Routledge, 2022, 221-234, https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003201205-17
  • [book chapter ] "Alternative Facts: Towards a Theorization of Oral History in Architecture," with Janina Gosseye and Naomi Stead In Architecture Thinking across Boundaries: Knowledge Transfers since the 1960s, edited by Rajesh Heynickx, Ricardo Costa Agarez and Elke Couchez, 136–148. 136–148. London: Bloomsbury Visual Arts, 2021, http://dx.doi.org/10.5040/9781350153202.ch-008.
  • [journal paper] "Comfort in Australia's unproductive North and the attendant anxiety of tropical cyclones", ABE Journal, March 2021 URL: http://journals.openedition.org/abe/9243; DOI: https://doi.org/10.4000/abe.9243
  • [International conference paper] 'Unrecognised actors and new networks. Teaching Tropical Architecture in mid-twentieth century Australia,' in Cosmopolitan Others, EAHN2021, 6th International Conference, Edinburgh 2021, June 4, 2021.
  • [panel discussion] Queensland Cultural Centre: Then, Now and New. Panel discussion between Michael Rayner, Ruth Woods and Dr Deborah van der Plaat and Lloyd Jones (moderator). Hosted by Queensland State Archives on Saturday March 13th, 2021 as part of the Asia Pacific Architecture Festival. https://vimeo.com/524021925

With John Macarthur, Jane Hunter, Andrew Wilson and industry partners State Library of Queensland, Conrad Gargett Architecture, Bligh Voller Nield, Wilson Architects and Riddel Architecture, Plaat wrote the successful Australian Research Council Linkage application "Architectural Practice in Post-war Queensland: Building and Interpreting an Oral History Archive" (2011-2013). This project resulted in the first comphrensive history on Queensland modernism and outputs included: a major exhibition, Hot Modernism: Building Modern Queensland 1945-1975 (State Library of Queensland, July- October 2014 curated with Janina Gosseye, Kevin Wilson and Gavin Bannerman); the creation and ongoing development of the Digital Archive of Qlueensland Architecture qldarch.net; and a book, Hot Modernism: Queensland Architecture 1945-1975 (London: Artifice Press, 2015 co-edited with John Macarthur, Janina Gosseye and Andrew Wilson). In 2017, the project was awarded the John Herbert Memorial Award and the Gold Heritage Award, Interpretation and Promotion by the National Trust of Australia, Queensland Branch. See also: http://www.uq.edu.au/research/impact/stories/hot-modernism-cool-resource/

From 2009-2011 Plaat was the recipient of the UQ Postdoctoral Fellowship for Women to work on her nominated project, "Tropical environments and Queensland architecture (1850-1914): building historical understandings of the culture of architecture and climate change." This project resulted in a symposium titled Architecture at the Ragged Edge of Empire: Race, Taste and Place and the Colonial Context (State Library of Queensland, Brisbane, 27-28 June, 2013) and a series of papers which explore the insection of architecture, climate and race in Queensland architecture. This research is ongoing.

Plaat has edited 5 books including: Skyplane: What effect do towers have on urbanism, sustainability, the workplace and historic city centres? (with Richard Francis Jones, Lawrence Nield, Xing Ruan, Sydney: UNSW Press 2009); Hot Modernism: Queensland Architecture 1945-1975 (with John Macarthur, Janina Gosseye and Andrew Wilson, London: Artifice 2015); Speaking of Buildings: Oral History in Architectural Research (with Janina Gosseye and Naomi Stead, New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2019); Karl Langer: Modern Architect and Migrant in Tropical Australia (with John Macarthur, London: Bloomsbury, 2022) and Light, Space, Place: the architecture of Robin Gibson (with Lloyd Jones, Melbourne: URO Publications, 2022). From 2010 to 2014 she was editor, with Paul Walker and Julia Gatley, of Fabrications: The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians of Australia and New Zealand. She has also published extensively in national and international journals.

Awards

American Society of Environmental Historians (ASEH) Travel Award 2019.

Graham Foundation Grant 2018.

John Herbert Memorial Award for the Most Outstanding Nomination, Hot Modernism: Exhibition, Digital Archive and Book, National Trust, Queensland, 2017.

Gold Heritage Award, Interpretation and Promotion, Hot Modernism: Exhibition, Digital Archive and Book, National Trust, Queensland, 2017.

Annual Conference Senior Scholar Fellowship, Society of Architectural Historians 2013.

Postdoctoral Fellowship for Women (University of Queensland) 2009-2012.

Memberships

Member, Society of Architectural Historians (SAH)

Member, European Architectural History Network (EAHN)

Member, the Architectural Humanities Research Association (AHRA)

Member, COST Action ISO904 European Architecture Beyond Europe

Member, Society of Architectural Historians of Australia and New Zealand (SAHANZ)

Member, Art Association of Australia and New Zealand (AAANZ)

Publications

Book Chapters (21)
Journal Articles (29)
Conference Papers (45)
Seminar Paper (1)
Creative Works (3)

Book Chapters

van der Plaat, Deborah (2022). The psychology of selling and the selling of architecture: Robin Gibson's early retail projects (1959-1970). Light, space, place: the architecture of Robin Gibson. (pp. 258-271) edited by Deborah van der Plaat and Lloyd Jones. Melbourne, VIC Australia: URO Publications.
van der Plaat, Deborah and Jones, Lloyd (2022). Robin Gibson: architecture in everyday pursuits. Light, space, place: the architecture of Robin Gibson. (pp. 13-21) edited by Deborah van der Plaat and Lloyd Jones. Melbourne, VIC Australia: URO Publications.
Macarthur, John and van der Plaat, Deborah (2022). Wireless architecture: Robert Cumming's early radio broadcasts. Architectural education through materiality: pedagogies of 20th century design . (pp. 221-234) edited by Elke Couchez and Rajesh Heynickx. Abingdon, Oxon, United Kingdom: Routledge. doi: 10.4324/9781003201205-17
Sully, Nicole and van der Plaat, Deborah (2022). Casting shadows and seeking shade. Drawing climate: visualising invisible elements of architecture. (pp. 120-149) edited by Daniel Ryan, Jennifer Ferng and Erik G. L'Heureux. Basel, Switzerland: Birkhäuser. doi: 10.1515/9783035623611-007
van der Plaat, Deborah (2022). The spell of the sunny south, the urge for 'Light, Sun and Air': the 'Human Aspect' and other ideas in Langer's Australian writings (1944-69). Karl Langer: Modern Architect and Migrant in the Australian Tropics. (pp. 105-142) edited by Deborah van der Plaat and John Macarthur. London, United Kingdom: Bloomsbury Publishing.
Gosseye, Janina, Stead, Naomi and van der Plaat, Deborah (2021). Alternative facts: towards a theorization of oral history in architecture.. Architecture thinking across boundaries: knowledge transfers since the 1960s. (pp. 136-148) edited by Rajesh Heynickx, Ricardo Costa Agarez and Elke Couchez. London, United Kingdom: Bloomsbury Visual Arts. doi: 10.5040/9781350153202.ch-008
van der Plaat, Deborah and Macarthur, John (2021). Introduction: modern and migrant architect. Karl Langer: modern architect and migrant in the Australian tropics. (pp. 1-12) edited by Deborah van der Plaat and John Macarthur. London, United Kingdom: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc..
van der Plaat, Deborah (2021). The spell of the sunny south, the urge for ‘light, sun and air’: the ‘human aspect’ and other: ideas in Karl Langer’s writings (1944-69). Karl Langer: modern architect and migrant in the Australian tropics. (pp. 105-141) edited by Deborah van der Plaat and John Macarthur. London, United Kingdom: Bloomsbury Publishing.
Stead, Naomi, Van der Plaat, Deborah and Gosseye, Janina (2019). Conclusion: Ways to listen anew: what next for oral history and architecture?. Speaking of buildings: oral history and architectural research. (pp. 282-297) edited by Janina Gosseye, Naomi Stead and Deborah van der Plaat. New York, NY, United States: Princeton Architectural Press.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2019). West's Furniture Store 1953. Australia modern: architecture, landscape & design 1925–1975. (pp. 135-135) edited by Hannah Lewi and Philip Goad. Melbourne, VIC, Australia: Thames and Hudson.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2017). Climatic discomforts: [sub]tropical climates, racial character and the nineteenth-century Queensland house. On discomfort : moments in a modern history of architectural culture. (pp. 51-63) edited by David Ellison and Andrew Leach. Abingdon, Oxon, United Kingdom: Routledge. doi: 10.4324/9781315598826
Stead, Naomi, van der Plaat, Deborah and Macarthur, John (2017). Building flagships: regionalism, place branding, and architecture as image in the Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane. Images of the art museum: connecting gaze and discourse in the history of museology. (pp. 261-286) edited by Eva-Maria Troelenberg and Melania Savino. Berlin, Germany: De Gruyter.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2015). ‘Shabby’ careers? Women working in architecture in post-war Queensland. Hot modernism: Queensland architecture 1945-1975. (pp. 183-199) edited by John P. Macarthur, Deborah van der Plaat, Janina Gosseye and Andrew Wilson. London, United Kingdom: Artifice.
van der Plaat, Deborah, Wilson, Andrew C. and Musgrave, Elizabeth (2015). Twentieth-century (sub) tropical housing: framing climate, culture and civilisation in post-war Queensland. Hot modernism: Queensland architecture 1945-1975. (pp. 75-99) edited by John P. Macarthur, Deborah van der Plaat, Janina Gosseye and Andrew Wilson. London, United Kingdom: Artifice.
van der Plaat, Deborah and Wilson, Andrew (2015). Bringing architecture to the people: defining architectural practice and culture in post-war Queensland. Hot modernism: Queensland architecture 1945-1975. (pp. 15-29) edited by John Macarthur, Deborah van der Plaat, Janina Gosseye and Andrew Wilson. London, United Kingdom: Artifice.
Macarthur, John and van der Plaat, Deborah (2012). Cummings, Robert. The encyclopedia of Australian architecture. (pp. 184-185) edited by Philip Goad and Julie Willis. Port Melbourne, VIC, Australia: Cambridge University Press.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2012). Critical [re] connections: Oscar Wilde’s ‘The Critic as Artist’ (1891). Semi-detached: Writing, representation and criticism in architecture. (pp. 211-220) edited by Naomi Stead. Melbourne, Australia: Uro Media.
de Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah (2011). European subtropical projections: Humboldt, Segalen, and the Musee qui Branly. Sweat: The Subtropical Imaginary. (pp. 17-27) edited by Andrew McNamara. Brisbane, Australia: Institute of Modern Art.
De Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah (2009). cloud in Musee du quai Branly: Photography in Architecture. Back to the City: Strategies for Informal Urban Interventions. (pp. 84-93) edited by Steffen Lehmann. Germany: Hatje Cantz Verlag.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2009). Disciplinary contrasts science, art and the imagination in the nineteenth-century writings of William Lethaby, John Ruskin and Alexander von Humboldt. Architecture, Disciplinarity and the Arts. (pp. 61-74) edited by Andrew Leach and John MacArthur. Louvain, Belgium: A & S Books (University of Ghent).
van der Plaat, Deborah (2009). Architectural wit: Aesthetics, spectacle and ideology in the Griffins' proposed Capital Building. Skyplane : What Effect Do Towers Have on Urbanism, Sustainability, the Workplace and Historic City Centres.. (pp. 174-185) edited by Richard Francis-Jones, Lawrence Nield, Xing Ruan and Deborah van der Plaat. Sydney, NSW: University of New South Wales Press.

Journal Articles

Fensham, Rachel, Sumner, Tyne Daile, Cutter, Nat, Buchanan, George, Liu, Rui, Munoz, Justin, Smithies, James, Zheng, Ivy, Carlin, David, Champion, Erik, Craig, Hugh, East, Scott, Hay, Chris, Given, Lisa M., Macarthur, John, McMeekin, David, Mendelssohn, Joanna and van der Plaat, Deborah (2024). Towards a national data architecture for cultural collections: designing the australian cultural data engine. Digital Humanities Quarterly, 18 (2), 20-23.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2021). Comfort in Australia’s unproductive North and the attendant anxiety of tropical cyclones. ABE Journal, 18 (18). doi: 10.4000/abe.9243
van der Plaat, Deborah (2019). The Auckland School: 100 Year of Architecture and Planning, 1917-2017. Fabrications-The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians Australia and New Zealand, 29 (3), 438-443. doi: 10.1080/10331867.2019.1667557
Barber, Daniel A., Stickells, Lee, Ryan, Daniel J., Koehler, Maren, Leach, Andrew, Goad, Philip, van der Plaat, Deborah, Keys, Cathy, Karim, Farhan and Taylor, William M. (2018). Architecture, environment, history: questions and consequences. Architectural Theory Review, 22 (2), 249-286. doi: 10.1080/13264826.2018.1482725
van der Plaat, Deborah (2018). An Oriental Continent: Climatic Determinism, Race and Identity in the Interwar Writings of Australian Architect William Hardy Wilson (1881–1955). Fabrications : The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians Australia and New Zealand, 28 (1), 67-87. doi: 10.1080/10331867.2017.1413703
van der Plaat, Deborah (2014). Visualising the critical: artistic convention and eclecticism in Oscar Wilde’s writings on the decorative arts. Australasian Journal of Victorian Studies, 19 (1), 5-19.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2013). Climatic crisis: place, taste and race in Hardy Wilson’s Dawn of a New Civilization (1929). Architectural Histories, 1 (1), 22.1-22.11. doi: 10.5334/ah.aw
van der Plaat, Deborah and Gatley, Julia (2013). Editorial. Fabrications, 23 (1), 1-3. doi: 10.1080/10331867.2013.793145
van der Plaat, Deborah and Gatley, Julia (2013). Disciplinarity. Fabrications, 23 (2), 133-135. doi: 10.1080/10331867.2013.860671
van der Plaat, Deborah and Gatley, Julia (2012). Editorial. Fabrications : The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians Australia and New Zealand, 22 (2), 137-139. doi: 10.1080/10331867.2012.733158
van der Plaat, Deborah and Walker, Paul (2012). Cosmopolis. Fabrications : The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians Australia and New Zealand, 21 (2), 4-7.
Gatley, Julia and van der Plaat, Deborah (2012). Editorial. Fabrications, 22 (1), 1-3. doi: 10.1080/10331867.2012.685632
Walker, Paul and van der Plaat, Deborah (2012). Editorial. Fabrications, 21 (1), 2-4.
van der Plaat, Deborah and Walker, Paul (2011). Editorial. Fabrications, 20 (2), 4-5. doi: 10.1080/10331867.2011.10539679
van der Plaat, Deborah (2011). Cosmopolitan interiors: Oscar Wilde and the House Beautiful. Interstices: Journal of Architecture and Related Arts, 12, 48-58.
Walker, Paul and van der Plaat, Deborah (2011). Editorial. Fabrications, 20 (1), 4-5.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2010). 620 Wickham Street. Architecture Australia, 99 (1), 72-76.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2009). Architectural ignorance and public indifference: Harold Desbrowe-Annear's lecture on "Some methods of Architectural criticism" (1893). Fabrications: The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand, 19 (1), 163-175.
Van der Plaat, Deborah (2008). Review of: Shifting views: Selected essays on the architectural history of Australia and New Zealand, Andrew Leach, Antony Moulis & Nicole Sully (eds), St Lucia, Queensland: UQP, 2008. Fabrications, 18 (2), 122-124.
de Lorenzo, C. and van der Plaat, Deborah Anne (2006). Southern geographies and the domestication of science in the photography of J. W. Lindt. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Art, 6/7 (2/1), 143-166.
van der plaat, Deborah and de Lorenzo, Catherine (2006). Sublimity and amenity at Lindt's Hermitage. Studies in Australian Garden History, 2, 3962-3985.
De Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah (2004). More than meets the eye: Photographic records of Humboldtian imaginings. Mosaic : A Journal for the Interdisciplinary Study of Literature, 37 (4), 237-253.
De Lorenzo, C and Van der Plaat, D (2004). 'Our Australian Switzerland': Lindt, Humboldt and the Victorian landscape. Studies in the History of Gardens & Designed Landscapes, 24 (2), 133-149.
de Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah (2004). ‘Our Australian Switzerland’: Lindt, Humboldt and the Victorian landscape. Studies in the History of Gardens & Designed Landscapes, 24 (2), 133-150.
van der plaat, Deborah (2004). The significance of the "temple idea" in William Lethaby's Architecture, Mysticism and Myth (1891). Nineteenth-Century Art World-Wide: A Journal of Nineteenth-Century Visual Culture, 3 (1).
Stewart, Susan, Hanna, Bronwyn, Thompson, Susan, Gusheh, Maryam, Armstrong, Helen and Van der Plaat, Deborah (2003). Navigating the sea of diversity: Multicultural place-making in Sydney. International Journal of Diversity in Organisations, Communities and Nations, 3, 233-246.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2002). (FAB12_1_002) 'Would you know the new, you must search the old': William Lethaby's 'Architecture, Mysticism and Myth' (1891) and the 'Hypnerotomachia Poliphili' (1499). Fabrications : The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand, 12 (1), 1-26.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2002). Seeking a 'symbolism comprehensible' to 'the great majority of spectators': William Lethaby's Architecture, Mysticism, and Myth and its debt to Victorian Mythography. Architectural History, 45, 364-385.
Van der Plaat, D (2002). Seeking a 'symbolism comprehensible' to 'the great majority of spectators': William Lethaby's architecture, mysticism and myth and its debt to Victorian mythography. Architectural History, 45, 363-385. doi: 10.2307/1568789

Conference Papers

van der Plaat, Deborah (2021). Unrecognised actors and multiple networks: Balwant Singh Saini and teaching tropical architecture in mid-twentieth century Australia. EAHN2021 Sixth International Meeting, Edinburgh, Scotland, 2-5 June 2021. Edinburgh, Scotland: University of Edinburgh .
van der Plaat, Deborah (2019). The Anxiety of Acclimatisation in the Architecture and Urban Planning of 19th Century Queensland (Australia). American Society of Environment History, Columbio, Ohio United States, 10-14 April 2019.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2019). Disease, discomfort and development: The physiological study of climate as scientific method in twentieth century Australia. iNTA 2019: Urban Tropicality, The University of Queensland Brisbane, 5-8 December 2019.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2019). Tropical comfort in the unproductive north. Commonwealth Bank Building, Cairns, 1922-1952.. iNTA2019: Urban Tropicality, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, 5-8 December 2019.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2018). The New Exhibition Building (1891): Liberalism, Settler Colonialism and Empire in 19th Century Queensland. Liberalism in the Built Environment: Then and Now, State Libary of Queensland, Brisbane, 17-19 May 2018.
van der Plaat, Deborah and Macarthur, John (2018). Robert Percy Cummings Radio Talks. 100 Year of Architectural Education in Queensland, QUT, Brisbane, 22-23 November 2018.
Macarthur, John and van der Plaat, Deborah (2018). Robert Percy Cummings Radio Talks. Objects & Technologies of Schooling. Rethinking 20th Century Architectural Pedagogies, Brisbane, QLD, Australia, 17 April 2018.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2017). Climatic Anxieties: Climate and Comfort in the Historiography of Australian Architecture. Environmental Histories Workshop, The University of Sydney, Sydney, 9-10 March 2017.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2017). Triumph in the Tropics (1959): The physiological study of climate, Queensland architecture, and the development debate. iNTA2017: 6th International Network of Tropical Architecture Conference: Tropical Storms as a Setting for Adaptive Development and Architecture, Florida, United States, 2-4 December 2017.
van der Plaat, Deborah and Macarthur, John (2017). A Quiet Revolution: Robert Percy Cummings’ unpublished talks (1930-1970). Educating Architects and Planners, 1917-2017, The University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand, 8-9 September 2017.
Gosseye, Janina, Stead, Naomi and van der Plaat, Deborah (2017). Alternative Facts: Towards a Theorisation of Oral History in Architecture. Theory's History 196X-199X - Challenges in the Historiography of Architectural knowledge, Ghent Belgium, 8-10 February 2017.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2017). Empty and Unproductive Australia: Migration, Race and Architecture in Twentieth Century Australia. Aesthetic Anxiety or Performative Subjectivity: National Narratives Encountering migrant architecture in Australia, Deakin University, Geelong, Australia, 16-17 November 2017.
van der Plaat, Deborah, Holden, Susan, Stead, Naomi and Greenop, Kelly (2015). Re-evaluating the Australian dream: narratives of high-rise living in Torbreck. Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand (SAHANZ) Annual Conference, Sydney, NSW, Australia, 7-10 July 2015. Sydney, NSW, Australia: SAHANZ.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2014). Architecture of sun and soil. European architecture in tropical Australia. EAHN Turin 2014: European Architectural History Network Third International Meeting, Turin, Italy, 19-21 July 2014. Turin, Italy: Politecnico di torino.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2014). Building and living north of the 28th parallel: climate, character and the Queensland house. Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand (SAHANZ) Annual Conference, Auckland, New Zealand, 2-5 July 2014. Gold Coast, QLD, Australia: SAHANZ.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2013). Oral history: abusive widow of [architectural] historiography?. Lost in Conversation: Constructing the Oral History of Modern Architecture, Brisbane, QLD, Australia, 1 November 2013.
van der Plaat, Deborah, Hunter, Jane, Gosseye, Janina, Macarthur, John and Wilson, Andrew (2013). Digital stories and semantic web technologies: new practices in developing and interpreting an architectural archive. 66th Annual Conference of the Society of Architectural Historians, Buffalo, NY, United States, 10-14 April 2013.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2013). Architecture at the ragged edge of empire: the problems of race, place and taste. Architecture at the Ragged Edge of Empire: Race, Place, Taste and the Colonial Context, State Library of Queensland, Brisbane, 27-28 June 2013.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2012). A state of critical becoming: colour, convention (Orientalism) and eclecticism in the aesthetic interior. Interior: A State of Becoming: An IDEA Symposium, Perth, WA, Australia, 6-9 September 2012. Perth, WA, Australia: Curtin University.
Hunter, Jane, Macarthur, John, van der Plaat, Deborah, Wilson, Andrew, Muys, Andrae and Bannerman, Gavin (2012). A Web 3.0 approach to building an online digital archive of architectural practice in post-war Queensland. International Council on Archives Congress 2012, Brisbane, QLD, Australia, 20 - 24 August 2012. Eagle Farm, QLD, Australia: International Council on Archives Congress.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2012). Contrasts (agency and difference) in nineteenth-century writings on architecture and design: Pugin, Ruskin and Wilde. Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand (SAHANZ) Annual Conference, Launceston, TAS, Australia, 5-8 July 2012. Launceston, TAS, Australia: University of Tasmania.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2012). Formal vocabularies. Cosmopolitanism, analogy and orientalism in Oscar Widle’s writings on art and architecture,. Victorian Vocabularies, AVSA 2012,, Griffith University, Brisbane, 11-14th April, 2012.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2012). Labour (productive and unproductive) and the economic landscape. UWA-UQ Workshop/ Historical and Cultural Studies of WA/QLD Goldfields and arid lands, Gwalia, Western Australia, 28 September 2012.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2012). A ‘style of architecture peculiarly suited to our requirements and climate’: physical, moral and disciplinary discomfort in Queensland architecture. Discomfort, Brisbane, Australia, 27 November 2012.
Hunter, Jane, Macarthur, John, van der Plaat, Deborah, Gosseye, Janina, Wilson, Andrew and Bannerman, Gavin (2012). A Web 3.0 approach to building an online digital archive of architectural practice in post-War Queensland. 17th International Council of Archives (ICA) Congress, Brisbane, Australia, 20-24 August 2012. Munich, Germany: De Gruyter Saur. doi: 10.3828/comma.2012.2.5
Stead, Naomi, van der Plaat, Deborah and Macathur, John (2011). A taste for place: The cultivation of an audience for climate-responsive architecture in Queensland. Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand (SAHANZ) Annual Conference, Brisbane, Australia, 7-10 July 2011. Brisbane, Australia: Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand (SAHANZ).
van der Plaat, Deborah (2010). The emancipated imagination and Victorian cosmopolis: Models of eclecticism in the work of GHM Addison. Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand (SAHANZ) Annual Conference, Newcastle, NSW, Australia, 30 June-2 July 2010. Newcastle, NSW, Australia: Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand (SAHANZ).
Leach, Andrew and van der Plaat, Deborah (2010). Towards a nineteenth century architectural history of Australia and New Zealand: A post-national, post-colonial perspective. 1st International Meeting of the European Architectural History Network (EAHN 2010), Guimaraes, Portugal, 17 - 20 June 2010. Lisbon, Portugal: CHAM Centro de Historia de Alem-Mar.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2008). Harold Desbrowe-Annears: Some Methods of Architectural Criticism. Art Association of Australia and New Zealand Annual Conference (AAANZ 2008), Brisbane, Australia, 4-6 December 2008. Brisbane, Australia: AAANZ.
de Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah (2008). Tropical Sublime in Jean Nouvel's "Musee Quai Branly". Art Association of Australia and New Zealand Annual Conference (AAANZ 2008), Brisbane, QLD Australia, 4-6 December 2008. Brisbane, QLD Australia: AAANZ.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2007). The emancipated imagination and disciplinary reunification in nineteenth Century writings on art, architecture and science. Colloquium of the Architecture Theory, Criticism & History Research Group, Institute of Modern Art, Judith Wright Centre of Contemporary Arts, Brisbane, 17-18 August, 2007. Ghent, Belgium: A & S/books.
de Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah (2007). Modernity, photography and the contemporary museum. 9th International Symposium: Pacific Arts Association (PAA), Paris, France, 5-7July 2007.
de Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah (2006). Art consuming architecture? Photography in Branly. 23rd Annual Conference of the Society of Architectural Historians Australia and New Zealand, Freemantle, WA, Australia, 29 September - 2 October 2006. Freemantle, WA, Australia: Society of Architectural Historians - Australia & New Zealand.
de Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah (2006). Interoperability and the photograph. Beyond Mimesis and Nominalism: Representation in Art and Science, London, United Kingdom, 22-23 June 2006. London, United Kingdom: London School of Economics.
De Lorenzo, Catherine and Van der Plaat, Deborah A. (2006). Realising Riley in Branly. Photography and the City, Dublin, Ireland, 29 June - 1 July 2006.
de Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah (2006). Contested Terrains. The 23rd annual conference of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand, Fremantle, Western Australia, Sep 29 - Oct 2 2006. Freemantle , Western Australia: Notre Dame University.
de Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah (2005). Ruskinian Readings: James Smith and John Lindt's representation of Victoria's Alpine forests. AAANZ 2005: Annual Conference of the Art Association of Australia and New Zealand Eril Baily; Roger Benjamin, Sydney, NSW Australia, 30 November - 2 December 2005. Sydney, NSW Australia: AAANZ.
de Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah (2004). European imaginings of wilderness in late nineteenth-century Australian photography. Art Association of Australia and New Zealand Conference (aaANZ Conference 2004), Auckland, New Zealand, 1-4 December 2004. Auckland, New Zealand: University of New Zealand.
van der Plaat, Deborah and Gusheh, Maryam (2004). The idea of the liberated imagination in Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffins' Capitol Building (1912). 21st Annual Conference of the Society of Architectural Historians of Australia and New Zealand, Melbourne, Australia, 26 - 29 September 2004. Melbourne, Australia: Society of Architectural Historians Australia & New Zealand.
De Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah A. (2004). Redefining the urban limits: European readings of wilderness, photography and late nineteenth century Australia. 21st Annual Conference of the Society of Architectural Historians Australia and New Zealand, Melbourne, Vic., 26-29 September, 2004. Melbourne, Vic.: Society of Architectural Historians Australia & New Zealand.
de Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah (2003). The emancipation of the untutored mind: The role of the exotic in Alexander von Humboldt’s aesthetic theory of nature. Art Association of Australia and New Zealand Conference 2003, Canberra, ACT Australia, 5-6 December 2003.
de Lorenzo, Catherine and van der Plaat, Deborah (2003). Von Humboldt, Lindt and deCastella. SSLA Conference 2003; Sydney Society of Literature and Aesthetics, Sydney, NSW Australia, 1-3 October 2003. Sydney, NSW Australia: Sydney Society of Literature and Aesthetics.
van der Plaat, Deborah (2000). 'The ambivalence of English modernism: Matthew Arnold’s theory of cultural perfection and the search for a modern architecture, 1890–1920'. 17th annual conference of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand, Wellington, New Zealand, 13-17 November, 2000.
van der Plaat, Deborah (1999). Beyond Ruskin: Arnoldian themes in William Lethaby's concpetion of architecture. 16th annual conference of the Society of Architectural Historians Australia and New Zealand, Launceston and Hobart, Tasmania, 28 September - 1 October, 1999.
van der Plaat, Deborah (1998). Desire not delight: William Lethaby’s Architecture, mysticism, and myth (1891). 15th annual conference of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand,, University of Melbourne, Victoria, 1998. Melbourne: Society of Architectural Historians Australia and New Zealand.

Seminar Paper

van der Plaat, Deborah (2013). The Liberated Imagination and the Capitol Building (Canberra, 1912).. Research in the architectural history of Canberra,. New Research in the architectural history of Canberra, Canberra Museum and Art Gallery, Canberra Museum and Art Gallery.

Creative Works

van der Plaat, Deborah, Sully, Nicole, Wilson, Andrew, Pettrup, Chenoa and Jefford, Adam (2018). Recollecting Home, curated by Deborah van der Plaat, Nicole Sully and Andrew Wilson. In Home: A Suburban Obsession, curated by Chenoa Pettrup and Adam Jefford. Brisbane, Australia: State Library of Queensland.
van der Plaat, Deborah, Gosseye, Janina and Bannerman, Gavin (2014). Hot Modernism: Building Modern Queensland, 1945-1975. State Library of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia:
Macarthur, John, Hunter, Jane, van der Plaat, Deborah, Gosseye, Janina and Bannerman, Gavin (2014). Digital Archive of Queensland Architecture. Brisbane, QLD, Australia: ATCH Research Centre UQ.

Areas of research

ATCH