SEDBERGH SCHOOL Maria, BSc Architecture (Hons), MPhil Cantab, ARB
There is huge difference in the weather between the UK and a lot of the home countries of many of our international pupils. Maria, who started at Sedbergh in year 10, came from a Spanish city in the African continent where, on the two days a year that it rained, PE classes were cancelled. So, transitioning from there to hard-core running in the fells regardless of the weather, but often in hail/snow/rain, was a new experience! Maria is now working in London as an architect and, inspired by the running and sports that she pursued at Sedbergh, is training for the Thames Path, her first ultramarathon (100km). “My years at Sedbergh School have been some of the best memories of my life, and the friendships I made through my time there are by far made up of some of the most influential people in my life, who are like family nowadays.” After leaving Sedbergh Maria read architecture at UCL. While she describes her time at UCL as an extremely challenging time, she believes that the endurance she developed at Sedbergh, whether running up the fells or when facing academic courses in her second language, was vital to getting on top of her university course. After graduating and working in London for a year as a part 1 architect, Maria then completed an MPhil in Architecture and Urban Design at Cambridge University. It was during her GCSEs (Year 11) that the idea of becoming an architect crystallised for Maria. An ‘outstanding’ teacher - one of the best she’s ever had - made Maths and Further Maths fun. At the same time, Maria was enjoying Art. The idea of combining them both became an exciting prospect. Maria says, “Order, beauty and people had always mattered to me, and Architecture started to be defined in those terms.” Maria’s ambition as an architect is to continue to research how to reduce the impact our built environment, and particularly housing in the UK, has upon our health and, as a result, the strain that it imposes on the NHS.
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