Bernadetta Budzik & Rachel Rouzaud: HM of the Himalayan Thermal Bath

+ Bernadetta Budzik 🇵🇱

+ Rachel Rouzaud 🇫🇷

Honourable Mention of the Himalayan Thermal Bath

Portfolio: https://www.non-a.com/members/bebe/

1) Could you briefly introduce yourself?

Polish+French team based in Paris. In addition to their career as architects, both of them pursue artistic practice and regularly come together to collaborate on various projects. Using the common ground of academia, they complement each other with their supplementary undertakings: Bernadetta with her writing and scenography expertise and Rachel with her work in tapestry and artistic installations. 

Language of expression: textiles, tapestry, written word, exhibitions.

2) What inspired you for the Himalayan Thermal Baths?

Usually in our practice we try to question tasks we are asked to do, we believe that just through that process we can form in the future our individual approach to architecture. In this case we questioned the brief of the competition itself, quikly we realised that we do not believe there is any need for typical architecture (building/pavilion/etc.). Knowing we will design more of the system and objects that will accompany this system, we started our research and got inspired by traditional art from the region.

3) Can you describe any particular challenges you faced during the design process and how
you overcame them?

As young professionals our main challenge was to find time and energy to work on the competition in addition to our everyday jobs as architects and work in our common practice.

4) How do you think your educational background or professional experiences influenced your winning design?

What is particular for our team is that we combine very different backgrounds in terms of education but also culture or even languages, it gives us more references to profit from and makes our work experience more interesting for us, as we continue to learn from each other.

5) What advice would you give to students or young professionals looking to excel in architecture competitions?

Taking time for the conception part of competition and then using very radical and simple representation would be one of our pieces of advice. 

6) What are your future aspirations in the field of architecture?

We continue working on projects where we try to join architecture and our art practice, mostly connected to tapestry and woodworking. On top of this we indulge regularly in research work. We hope that continuing with our approach we can grow our practice and work on interesting projects.