Tiffany Jordan

Tiffany Jordan knew way back in primary school that she liked drawing houses, but it wasn’t until her parents told her she could do it for a living that she decided that was her ideal career. The award-winning architectural technologist is now pursuing her dream and working at PF&A. She told us about her career to date.

“It’s something I wanted to do from Year Six, I started drawing houses when I was younger. My dad said ‘you know you can do that, it’s a career path, building houses’.

“From that point I knew that’s what I wanted to end up doing. So I did my GCSEs, hoping that they would lead me to the next stage. I then went to Cardiff Metropolitan University for my under grad and did three years there, doing an architectural design and technology course.

“I came back to the island and worked for two years, but I knew that I still wanted to keep learning so I went and did my Masters last year at Edinburgh University in Architectural Conservation.”

Along the way Tiffany has scooped various awards, including Outstanding Graduating Student from CIAT in 2017, Capita’s Project of the Year Award and she was also the Property and Construction Awards Aspiring Star award winner in 2019.

That’s where she caught the eye of local firm PF&A.

“I went to the award ceremony on my own and PF&A had their own table there. Peter Falla actually won the Lifetime Achievement Award that same night.

“When I went back to Edinburgh, I actually had a message in my LinkedIn inbox from one of the bosses at PF&A saying, ‘Hey we saw that you won the award and congratulations. Do you want to get coffee?’

“And so we went for coffee at Christmas, I just assumed that they just wanted to get to know me a bit and not really offer me anything but actually they said, ‘do you want to come in tomorrow and work for us for two weeks?’”

She was later offered a full-time role by PF&A to start in March. The pandemic meant that she didn’t return to the island until August, which is when she took up the position. It’s incredible to think of the focus and determination that is involved in pursuing a career path from such a young age. Even Tiffany acknowledges she’s unusual among her peers.

“It’s very interesting having friends around me who even now they’re saying, ‘Oh, I’m not quite sure if I’m in the career I want to be in, I’m not sure what I want to do’.

“Whereas with me, they would always say: ‘Tiffany knows what she’ll do, she’ll go off and do architecture’ and I did!”

Tiffany explains what it is about architecture that interests her and has continued to inspire her for such a long time.

“When I was younger, I thought it was the art side of things that I really liked doing, I loved the creative subjects at school. But as I got older, I started to realise it wasn’t necessarily the design and actually, I’m probably not the best person to come to, to make a house that pretty because my mind works in a very technical way which has meant that I’ve gone into architectural technology, because I like to problem solve.

“I love working to the regulations and making sure that it fits. If there’s an issue with a junction between a roof and a wall, how that comes together, I like trying to work that out in my head, and come up with solutions that will actually work.

“So it has progressed in that sense that it’s kept my interest by being something that actually has evolved into a very specific part of architecture rather than just architecture as a whole.”

Rather than be inspired by a particular style of architecture or an architect, Tiffany says she loves detail and makes a point of seeking it out in the various buildings she sees.

“The thing that I constantly do is look up, that’s one thing that people don’t do very often, but even in new places where I go, I love to look up because there’ll be things that you don’t notice.

“For me it’s probably more boring things like flashings and details of lead and things like that, but it’s those bits of the architecture that inspire me as opposed to actual people, actual movements and things like that.

I’M MUCH MORE HAPPY BEING GIVEN A PROBLEM, AND THEN TRYING TO SOLVE IT, OR SEEING SOMETHING THAT HAS BEEN A SOLUTION TO A PROBLEM I THINKING, OH, I COULD USE THAT SOMEWHERE.

THERE ARE ALREADY THINGS THAT I NOTICED THAT I’VE NEVER NOTICED BEFORE BECAUSE I TOOK THE TIME TO JUST LOOK AT THEM MORE AND ACTUALLY SEE THE DETAIL, WHICH IS MY JOB. I LOVE DETAIL. “I’m much happier being given a problem, and then trying to solve it, or seeing something that has been a solution to a problem and thinking, oh, I could use that somewhere.”

She’s used her lockdown time to get out and make a point of looking at her surroundings.

“I’m thinking, right I’ve got two hours, and I don’t have to do anything in these two hours.

“I’m not rushing off to see friends or to get shopping done or all these kind of things so I purposely take the time to just look at things.

“There are already things that I noticed that I’ve never noticed before because I took the time to just look at them more and actually see the detail, which is my job. I love detail.”

As for the future, Tiffany’s working towards gaining accreditation but she also wants to address a conundrum that’s long been an issue in the world of architectural design.

“I want to do a bit more on community projects, if I can, when I get older.”

Both Tiffany’s dissertations examined the issue of accessibility in towns, and whether listing a property should take precedence over accessibility.

She’s keen to find a balance between the two so that a listed building’s character can be maintained while at the same time ensuring it’s accessible to wheelchair users or people with disabilities. It’s an issue that so far hasn’t found an easy solution, but it’s close to Tiffany’s heart.

“I’ve had a lot of connections with people with disabilities and elderly people in my life. I worked in a nursing home during my gap year to get money to go to university. I have close family who need wheelchairs.

“Seeing that they can’t do normal, every day things, it’s hard to see. So, using my problem solving mind I want to be able to say, look, this is achievable, you can do it.”

She firmly believes that it’s possible for a building to retain its listed status while at the same time being accessible for people who are differently abled.

“You can’t just say ‘it’s listed’ as an excuse for everything. There should be ways to solve it, there are definitely ways of solving it in those places.

“Edinburgh was a very good example of how access can slowly be introduced into a more historic environment, and it’s partly why I chose to go up there. “So hopefully I can work towards trying to push that through a bit more and get it so that everyone can appreciate Town and other areas of the island because we have a very lovely island here, there’s so much to see and do.

“But after time, or after an injury or something you may potentially never get to experience them again and that just seems ridiculous that something man made isn’t accessible to humans. We built it. We’ve made it so why can’t we make it accessible to everyone? It doesn’t make sense. So that’s where I want to lead.”