A homegrown architect-designer, schooled in cosmopolitan institutions abroad, was honored recently in appropriate ceremonies in Cebu City for her “exceptional innovation and artistry across diverse creative fields.”
Vanessa Gaston, program chair of the Department of Architecture of Foundation University, Dumaguete City, received the 2025 Blue Mango Award for Creative Leadership. The award was named after the imaginary “blue mango,” symbolizing creativity and imagination.
Gaston, who placed fifth in the Philippine licensure examination for architects, said she was “surprised and did not expect to get the award.” Aside from her administrative and teaching job at Foundation University, she is actively involved in community work in Negros Island, primarily spurring local groups of artisans to use native materials.
“We have a very rich cultural history, we should savor it,” articulates Gaston as she combines tradition with some innovation, and applies these in the contemporary setting. Her reach expands as she is board member of the non-profit group, Arts and Design Collective Dumaguete, as founder of Negros Design Week and the Very Good Volunteer Group, one of the region’s first organized design volunteer groups.
She likewise represented the experiences of Visayan craft and design at the Salone Satellite 2025 in Milan, Italy, the world’s most important design event. Through her collection titled “Common Fabric,” she showed contemporary expressions of traditional knowledge of sinamay, raffia, rattan, and wood from the islands of Bohol and Negros Province.
“The collection narrated powerfully our interwoven realities, the invisible strand that connects people and practices in the so-called fabric of life,” enthuses Gaston, who never fails to instill among her students that architecture is not all about spaces and design, but moreso about what the client wants.
She takes pride in the flagship project of the Department of Architecture called Estudio Damgo, now on its 14th year, as the first and the only student-led project in the country where they design, fund, and build sustainable structures in identified communities.
Gaston dreams of the day when design leaders stay in the homeland to engage in community-based practice, thus, empowering the future of architecture in the country. | NWI
