María José Orihuela first set foot School of Architecture at the age of five. It was December, and the school was hosting a children’s Christmas card contest. She remembers peeking into the workshops and seeing an endless array of models. A few years later, she told her parents, María del Pilar Martínez Costa and José Luis Orihuela—both professors at the School of Communication—that she wanted to be an architect when she grew up.
In 2006, she began a new chapter as a university student, where she discovered a stimulating environment in which she immersed herself completely. She recalls that Carlos Naya invited the architect and painter César Barrio to his subject on Form Analysis, where he tasked him with teaching the basics of composition to the future architects. A recurring question accompanied them throughout the rest of the degree program: does it work or doesn’t it? The answer, of course, went beyond function and mere composition, laying the first foundations for the projects that would follow. María José graduated in 2012 and entered the workforce, first in Paris and then in London.
With professional experience and a Master's Degree the Architectural Association in London, Orihuela decided to return to his alma mater, the University, to combine his degree program with his thesis . Under the supervision of Carlos Naya, director the School of Architecture Sonia Rivas, professor in the Faculty of Education Psychology and member of committee Navarra committee , he conducted the research for Learning in 20th-Century Pedagogical Traditions,” which he defended on May 6.
He acknowledges that there is a clear before and after the thesis “That shift takes shape in tandem with the teaching Project Workshops III and IV, and it’s something I’m incredibly grateful for. When facing a student, one is compelled to articulate ideas that exist in the mind in a very abstract form. Witnessing how other professors—Luis Suárez, Conrado Capilla, Mario Galiana, and Miguel Ángel Díaz Camacho—engage in that same exercise by establishing a dialogue with students has been not only formative for me, but also fundamental to my research.”
On June 5, she received her doctoral degree, marking the start of a new phase professor which she hopes to “continue learning from her students, through their questions and their learning processes.”
During the graduation ceremony, María José couldn’t help but recall the graduation of her father, José Luis Orihuela, who received his doctorate from the School of Communication years ago. In one of the photographs from that day, they both appear in their respective gowns—he as a doctor, and she as a recent graduate of kindergarten. June 5 was a way of coming full circle thirty years later.
María José acknowledges that “it’s a challenge academic work with something that takes place outside the university,” but she encourages future doctoral students to research issues “that, when approached from an academic perspective, connect with society’s current concerns.”
