Claudia Barreda was born in Lima, Peru, educated in Australia and lived and worked in Mexico and a variety of cities in the U.S. before settling in Houston. All of those places helped shape the creative eye of the architect-designer who now works at the Laura U Design Collective. Claudia is the Houston Design District’s November Leaders In Design honoree.
“I always wanted to be a doctor and I started college as pre-med, but realized that was not for me. Growing up, I was always curious about houses and whenever we went to a new house, I would look at all of the details,” Claudia says. “My uncle was an architect and I watched him design homes, and I thought that one day I would design my own house.”
In Houston, Claudia has also worked for Mirador Group, Cannon Design and Brickman Design. Her frequent moves were made because her husband’s job required that they move around.
In each locale, she has appreciated its native materials. Here, she turns to Texas limestone, white oak and stucco. But she also appreciates the durability of manmade materials such as wood-like exterior materials and aluminum cladding.
Now married and a mother of three, she studied architecture at Canberra University in Australia because her grandfather had been the Peruvian ambassador to Australia and she had a number of family members there. When the Shining Path guerillas brought violence to Peru, her father planned to move their family to Australia and sent Claudia there first for school.
It was there she learned an appreciation for sustainability and passive building some 30 years ago. “My education had a big impact on being mindful about the environment and building things that are timeless. You make things with less waste and nothing trendy because you want it to last for a very long time.”