Architecture student wins Angola trip award
30th March 2009
Paulo Moreira, a postgraduate student at London Met's Department of Architecture and Spatial Design is to be honoured with the Noel Hill Student Travel Award at the 2009 Excellence in Design Awards Gala.
Paulo Moreira, a postgraduate student at London Met's Department of Architecture and Spatial Design is to be honoured with the Noel Hill Student Travel Award at the 2009 Excellence in Design Awards Gala.
In parallel with the professional awards, the Noel Hill Student Travel Awards Programme recognises future talent from students currently enrolled in UK universities. Entrants are assessed on their portfolio of work and their proposal for study-based travel experience abroad.
Paulo, who studies MA Cities Design and Urban Cultures, submitted a proposal entitled The Survival of the School: Post-Colonial Transformations in Angola and Mozambique. His proposal focused on the architecture of schools in conflict areas, particularly in Angola and Mozambique.
Combining his MA research and a real commission to design a primary school, he plans to visit the proposed site of the school. During his visit he will examine the educational buildings in the surrounding area and analyse how they adapted to the successive episodes of conflict in the territory. He will also develop his knowledge of the community's needs so as to plan the school as an engine for social development.
Paulo is also planning a short trip to Mozambique where his grandparents lived in ex-Portuguese colonies. Whilst there he hopes to investigate the process of negotiations his grandmother went through whilst building a primary school in Xai-Xai and to relate this back to his project in Angola.
Commenting on the award, Paulo said: 'The possibility of realising this trip will be a remarkable moment for my academic and professional education and an undeniable opportunity for personal enrichment'.