Charlie White

I am a qualified Architect, Tutor, and PhD researcher at the Manchester School of Architecture. Funded by the Leverhulme Trust, my doctoral thesis is titled Sonic Urbanism: Negotiating Noise in the Nocturnal City. The research examines how nightclub sound emerges as a contested terrain in processes of urban regeneration, situating noise disputes as struggles over cultural value, belonging, and inequality. Bringing together soundscape fieldwork, ethnographic observation, and policy analysis, the project develops the concept of a ‘right to noise’ as both an analytical framework and a policy agenda for more inclusive nocturnal governance. As part of my research, I collaborate with advocacy organisations including the Berlin Clubcommission and the UK Music Venue Trust, enabling close engagement with club communities in Berlin, Manchester, Tbilisi, Vienna, Cologne, Geneva, and Copenhagen. My research extends a notion of ‘sonic urbanism’ to span noise governance, cultural policy, and the role of nightclub culture in shaping urban spaces.

Academic and Professional Qualifications

PhD (in progress), Manchester School of Architecture, Doctoral Scholarship funded by the Leverhulme Trust 

Architect (ARB), Architects Registration Board
PG Cert Advanced Diploma in Professional Practice, Royal Institute of British Architects 
MPhil Architecture and Urban Design, University of Cambridge
BA (Hons) Architecture, Manchester School of Architecture

Research Output:

Vienna After Dark Conference 14/11/24 (Keynote + Panel Talk)

UK Night Time Industry Summit 06/02/25 (Keynote)

Geneva Night Council 11/04/25 (Keynote + Panel Talk)

LUDeC Connections

My research project, Sonic Urbanism: Negotiating Noise in the Nocturnal City, aligns closely with the objectives of the Leverhulme Unit for the Design of Cities of the Future (LUDeC) through its commitment to developing a more humanistic, equitable, and experimental vision of urbanism. LUDeC emphasises the need to move beyond narrow disciplinary framings of the city as a site of competition and towards collaborative approaches that foreground lived experience and social justice. My work addresses this by situating sound—not as a technical nuisance to be suppressed, but as a cultural and political medium through which inclusion, belonging, and inequality in the city are negotiated.

Clubbing, and the disputes over nightclub sound, provide a lens through which to explore how cities can embrace rather than regulate difference. This responds directly to LUDeC’scall to valorise playful and experimental practices in urban life, recognising how nocturnal soundscapes generate forms of communitas, identity, and solidarity that are vital to a just and liveable city. The project also embodies LUDeC’s emphasis on transdisciplinarity, integrating architectural and urban analysis with sound studies, ethnography, and policy research, while collaborating with advocacy organisations such as the Berlin Clubcommission and the UK Music Venue Trust.

In line with LUDeC’s focus on place, partnership, and community, my research develops participatory and practice-based methods that engage cultural actors in shaping more inclusive governance of the night. By reframing noise as a right, it seeks to stimulate debate and policy change that embraces diversity, disrupts overly ordered environments, and contributes to imagining more vibrant, layered, and equitable urban futures.

Contact Information:

charles.white2@stu.mmu.ac.uk