House of the Future prize winner - Maria Jose Fernandez Serrano-Ridaa Abdeslam Ahmed

We’d like to take the opportunity to introduce you to the prize winner of our "House of the Future competition – Maria Jose Fernandez Serrano!

Maria Jose Fernandez Serrano

Please tell us about your company (when it was founded, where it is based, how many employees, etc) Alternatively, if you do not have a company, please give us some insights on your own professional/academia background.

We are two young architects, who really enjoy architecture and art, willing to face innovative and creative architecture challenges. As a working and academic background, we have an Architecture Master’s degree and we have worked national and internationally as Junior Architects for several years.

Brief information about the projects that you/your company have been involved with. For instance, what scale have you focused on/preferred, any significant projects where the company/ individuals have been Involved?

We have designed, in an academic and working environment, a series of differently scaled and topic projects. We have been greatly influenced by our immediate local and historical patrimony, being able to work in a diverse range of scales. Among them, we have faced urban scale interventions, developing residential and equipment master-plans, to intermediate scale buildings, like sport, cultural or complexes. As well, we have worked in small scale proposals, like single-family houses or small interventions, including the detail scale. We see architecture as a toll that allow us to intervene in a great variety of scales, enriching itself at the same time.

What does architecture mean to you and what is the role of an architect in your society?

Why do you participate in architecture competitions?

We see it as an opportunity to experiment and to be able to face unconventional challenges, that make us reflect about the future architecture and how it would be applied now. Architecture competitions force us to go beyond our comfort zone, breaking our own limits as architect, being able to learn day by day a little bit more.

What advice would you give to individuals who struggle to decide whether it would be beneficial for them to participate in architecture competitions?

We will encourage other to do architecture competitions because it is a great way of learn new things by giving yourself a fun challenge to do. Our advice will be just to enjoy the process, have fun and use it as a way to liberate your creativity. An architecture competition is a perfect environment to allow yourself to experiment and go beyond what you normally would or be able to do, expanding your vision and skill as an architect.