Xanthe’s story

A “Poetic and evocative description of her childhood and delightful explanation of how she began engaging with architecture.”

This is how Dipa Joshi, Xanthe’s external examiner for her Part 3 Architectural qualification at the Bartlett School of Architecture, described our coworker Xanthe’s story of becoming an architect.

Xanthe won the Ross Jamieson Memorial Prize for achieving the overall highest grades in her cohort, showing her abilities and experience all round. Passing these professional qualifications means that Xanthe was able to be registered as an Architect.  In fact, she is the only Xanthe on the UK register of architects!

One part of her submission was her Personal Development Appraisal (PDA). The PDA is a reflective piece that details her journey to qualifying. In this, Xanthe took us back to her childhood in Newfoundland to trace the roots of her interest in what makes a successful built environment, and the values that she brings to her architecture.

Her story recognises that the route into architecture isn’t always clear, but just because you haven’t taken the straight route, doesn’t mean it isn’t the correct one for you.

Our experience of the built environment is very personal and our environment shapes our experiences more than most people realise. For those who see this, architecture can be more than a career. It is a calling.

Xanthe’s story was described by her assessors as “a delight to read”, and we agree. Here we wanted to share her reflections on how her early experiences growing up in Newfoundland have influenced not only her choice of career, but also her strong community and environmental ethos.

Newfoundland

“My experience and understanding of the world were shaped by the harsh weather that battered the jagged coasts and wooden saltbox houses of Newfoundland, where I grew up. I didn’t know it at the time, but my childhood was immersed in a wonderfully strong sense of community and togetherness that was bred from learning how to cope with the beautifully rural, yet sometimes harsh, environments.

In the winter, my sisters and I would burrow into snowbanks to build snow forts, clear ice rinks on the local pond, and leave snowmen to stand guard. We’d then retreat into our timber clapboard house to drink hot chocolate by the wood stove.

In summer, we would play on the rocky beaches and move big stones to create our imaginary worlds. When the tide came in, we would rock hop along the nearly submerged boulders, the rooftops of our make-believe town, nearly underwater.

We would walk to the local shop to buy popsicles, greeted by a warm hello, with often miscounted change, always met with an ‘Oh don’t worry about that – just come back with a little extra next time!’

Grounding Principles

I have found myself grounded by three principles that stem from these simple childhood experiences, which have inevitably shaped the way I approach architecture.

The first is that any material can be a building material – and something local is often a better option. Natural materials have properties inherent to the place they are from – a quality not shared by man-made ones. This is not to say engineered materials are not important but to recognise their differences.

Second, is the central role of place. I think that anywhere, can become a ‘place’ whether it is a tree providing shelter, or a row of boulders turned into an imaginary land. I find this particularly important today, especially when looking at gentrification versus regeneration, and how and when the memory of a place should be protected.

The third is the importance of socially positive spaces that enhance community, even in the most rural of places. For example, a simple roof overhang at my childhood corner shop protected from a snowy or rainy day and allowed simple actions like holding the door for the person behind you, so you can catch a quick chat or smile. These small interventions create interactions that have hugely positive knock-on effects for a sense of community and togetherness

It took a lot of time for me to distil these childhood experiences into ideas and principles I could implement. Growing up in a place with very few architects, meant many of the structures built around me were of practical necessity – the architectural profession was somewhat unknown to me on that level. Not to say the buildings I grew up in were not beautiful, but they were made beautiful by the people who occupied them and took care of them. When travelling to see my Dad’s relatives in the UK as a child we always visited amazing cathedrals and castles on our journeys, but then I had no true grasp on how these buildings came to be, only the stories and folklore tales around what had happened there, who had been there when, and why. This was enough to fascinate me; the idea that the buildings I was in first existed in someone’s mind, and then somehow were built, and then inevitably became its own ‘place’.

I realised when I was about 16 that architecture encapsulated all the things that fascinated me as a child. Through my high school art teacher, David Trainor, I learned how to see beauty and character born out of the simple structures of Newfoundland, through drawing, painting, and modelling. Being good at math and science, but loving art too much to want to study engineering, landed me on the Glasgow School of Art course page for the Bachelor’s in Architecture programme.

Becoming an Architect

The rest is history – through the excellent architecture course at Glasgow School of Art and roles at Miller Howard Architects and Urbanist Architecture, Xanthe has become a talented, committed and engaged architect and valued collaborator at Collective Works. We’re delighted that, as noted by Joshi, Xanthe has brought her “strong ethical values” as well as her energy and enthusiasm to Collective Works. Together, we will follow Xanthe’s mission to make architecture more accessible, more beautiful and more responsible.

Xanthe Wilkins