Samantha Knights

Following moving to England from Trinidad as a child, an awareness of how different environments can be is something I developed early.

I believe the impact of this awareness ultimately turned into an intrinsic interest that led me to become an architect. During my studies, I focused on regeneration and resilience of places that reinforced this. And as an architect, I have worked on projects in the heritage, cultural and residential sector. Securing planning permission and delivering design solutions for complex projects with new build and heritage buildings. This has included working on listed buildings in sensitive sites such as conservation areas and a UNESCO World Heritage site. Projects include museum’s and heritage attractions, artist workshops, community centres conversions into residential.

I have also enjoyed different opportunities to contribute outside my project work too. This includes attending Manchester University Employers Café Networking event to giving advice to students, being a guest speaker at Manchester School of Architecture Panel and helping to mentor students beginning their careers within architecture through the RIBA scheme. Outside architecture, I have also volunteered as a Team Leader at the Manchester International Festival.