Wessel Badenhorst, formerly an economic development officer in Dun Laoghaire Rathdown County Council, is a lead expert in the EU’s URBACT Programme that supports cities to work together on integrated urban development themes. In 2011, he completed a training course in New York with Project for Public Spaces (PPS) on Placemaking. Since then he conducted training workshops in a number of cities including during the URBACT Festival in Lisbon in 2018 and the Merging the Split Conference in Zadar in 2019.

In 2020, together with international placemaking expert Cynthia Nikitin, he facilitated an online placemaking training programme in Cork City, with the participants in this 5 week programme ranging from Council officials, design professionals to community leaders.

Originally from Cape Town, South Africa, Wessel came to Ireland in 2000 and lives in Bray, Co. Wicklow. He holds a MBA degree from Dublin City University together with degrees in Law and Psychology from the University of Pretoria.