Martha Pomasonco wins 2023 RIBA Norman Foster Travelling Scholarship

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) is pleased to announce Martha Pomasonco of the University of Lima (Peru) as the winner of the 2023 RIBA Norman Foster Travelling Scholarship for her project “Upgraded Barrios”.

The annual scholarship offers £7,000 to fund research by an architecture student who demonstrates original thinking on issues relating to the sustainable survival of cities and towns.

Martha intends to use the £7,000 travel scholarship to gather valuable first-hand information on the impact of neighborhood improvement projects in Latin America. Through direct observation and in-depth interviews, Martha’s work will evaluate and compare the impact of the different projects she visits. The research aims to provide lessons and strategies that can be applied to future interventions.

Her travel proposal spans 54 days and covers 7 countries and projects. She plans to start by studying the Barrio Mio project in Lima, before travelling to Mexico City, and from there head to Medellin, Colombia, to explore the Urban Integration Project. From there she intends to travel to La Paz, Bolivia, where she will analyze the Barrios de Verdad projects. Proceeding to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Martha will study the Favela-Bairro project. After that, she will travel to Rosario, Argentina, followed by the Quiero mi Barrio project in Santiago, Chile, before returning to Lima.

Given the exceptional standard of applications this year, the jury also commended Jan Dabrowski from ETH Zürich (Switzerland) for their project “Atlas of Vanishing: Documenting West Africa's Forgotten Architecture”.

2023 RIBA Norman Foster Travelling Scholarship recipient, Martha Pomasonco, said: “I am delighted and honoured to have been selected as the winner of the 2023 RIBA Norman Foster Travelling Scholarship. I’d like to thank the University of Lima for nominating me, and the judging panel of the scholarship for selecting me. The scholarship will allow me to conduct research on my project ‘Upgraded Barrios’. It will let me gather valuable first-hand information on the impact of the most successful upgrading programmes in informal settlements promoted by Latin-American countries to find design lessons related to sustainability across time.”

RIBA President Simon Allford said: “I was struck by Martha’s project to investigate the design and structure of large scale informal urban settlements in Latin America. I look forward to seeing what she learns of the relationship between the urban and architecture infrastructure and lives of the residents in these communities. I would also like to thank Lord Foster and the Foundation for their continued support that facilitates individual research projects such as this.”

Lord Foster said: “The jury was impressed by the high standard of entries for this year’s Travelling Scholarship. However, they were unanimous in their selection of Martha Pomasonco’s proposal, which was to gather valuable first-hand information on the impact of neighborhood improvement projects in Latin America. We offer our congratulations to Martha for her well-deserved win and look forward to when she will be able to share the results of such a worthy study.”

This year’s scholarship attracted 60 applications, one of the highest application numbers since the scholarship was first awarded in 2007.

The judging panel was comprised of:

• Norman Foster, Lord Foster of Thames Bank (Founder and Executive Chairman, Foster + Partners; President, Norman Foster Foundation)
• Farshid Moussavi OBE RA (Founder, Farshid Moussavi Architecture; Professor in Practice of Architecture at Harvard University; Trustee of the Norman Foster Foundation)
• Simon Allford (Founding Director at Allford Hall Monaghan Morris; RIBA President 2021-23)
• Chitra Marsh (Director at Buttress Architects; National Chair of Women in Property; RIBA Council member)