Huddersfield student quartet fly the flag for northern architects

Four architecture students from the University of Huddersfield gave an excellent account of themselves at a prestigious design competition, co-organised by the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA), that focused on budding architects in the north of England.

Evie Cox, Asma Moazzam, Shoaib Hussain and Yuliia Romanets collaborated with students from a number of northern architecture schools after being given a brief at the Northern Soul Design Competition at the University of Lancaster.  

Split across different groups, the quartet explored older areas of Lancaster city centre before being tasked with coming up with new design concepts in collaboration with their new colleagues in just two hours.

Study architecture at the University of Huddersfield

Shoaib’s group were named as winners while Evie’s was commended, and Asma and Yuliia’s groups were commended for their presentations and contributions to an event enjoyed by over 40 students.

Benefits of networking

The quartet, who were accompanied by senior lecturer Dr Danilo Di Mascio, particularly prized their interactions with like-minded fellow students as an ideal stepping stone into a profession where teamwork and collaborating on new ideas are vital. 

“It’s a very sociable profession, and networking is a very valuable tool for the future,” said Evie. “I’ll have to talk to new people when I start my career, so this was a great opportunity to meet a lot of different people all at once. And creating something new in an unfamiliar place was also really valuable for us.”

Asma adds, “It wasn’t just about ideas, it was about different ways of portraying them and different visual representations.

“Networking was the biggest takeaway for me. You are talking to people and working in a team in a pressured situation, but you are all talking the same language. Hearing other perspectives on the same idea was really interesting, and hearing what other people had to say was very cool.”

'Time for the North to shine!'

Yulia agreed with her colleagues, adding, “There’s a lot of communications within architecture, and that’s what we’ll have to learn and develop.

“Getting to know people and working on a project with people you don’t know was a really nice experience, and I found that pushing myself a bit was good for me.”

Shoaib added, “Everyone was in the same boat, we found our common ground and discovered the strengths and weaknesses in our groups. That helped us work together to produce some nice concepts.

“The presentation was daunting, because when you present at university your lecturers know about you and what concepts you like. We were talking to people we didn’t know in Lancaster, but once we were into it, we realised we needed to stick to what we know best.

“It was great to see universities from the North coming together, it’s nice to see the North getting the chance to shine!”

Dr Di Mascio was delighted with how the quartet responded to the challenges posed in Lancaster, adding, “It was interesting to expose the group to different ways of thinking, in terms of design and representational techniques. They interacted really well with students from other universities, underscoring the importance of networking and building connections. 

“I was really pleased at the way they developed their team-working skills, which is not easy, and how they reacted to a different kind of brief. They welcomed  the idea of working on a brief that allowed them to explore an unfamiliar  urban environment, and I think it has really helped build their confidence when presenting and explaining their ideas and methods.”