Written By: Melissa Cancio
One of Florida International University’s Architecture students and an MBUS Leads scholar was presented with a once in a lifetime opportunity. On September 3, 2018, Camila Lohezic started a 6-month internship that is based in Paris, France. She is one of four students chosen through a prestigious process of hundreds of applicants to intern at the Renzo Piano Building Workshop (RPBW).
As Camila’s last year approached, she heard about an amazing opportunity from Associate ProfessorJason Chandler, the Chair of the Department of Architecture at FIU. According to Camila, Professor Chandler makes several public announcements every semester, but this one really caught her interest. “Instantly, there was a huge shift of the energy in the room. I had never heard a more compelling announcement!” exclaimed Camila.
Camila explained that the selection process was based on anonymous ten-page digital portfolios,“I found it difficult to narrow down the work I had done to ten pages and it was challenging to graphically present the work in an elegant, yet compelling manner”. She further explains “I emailed some faculty members for advice because my highest priority became to refine that portfolio into the very best it could be.”
Camila believes this experience will broaden her view of how art, culture and place will affect her architectural practice “architecture is not just about buildings, rather, about serving people a place to live good lives. My hope is to become more cultured… through history, art and theater.”
Renzo Piano has three offices: Genova, Paris, and New York City. He started the Renzo Piano Foundation, also known as the “Fondazione Renzo Piano in Italian, in 2004 for architects. He has studios to study models, physical crafts, drawings and more as a way to differentiate his architectural firm with other offices. Working with Renzo Piano, the Pritzker Award winning architect, will allow her to “be bold, brave and happy” like he exemplifies in her eyes. Camila is very enthusiastic about these next six months and looks forward to the next great opportunity in her college career.
If you would like to have more information on the internship at Renzo Piano, click here and some photos are shown here.
