Associate Professor Aziza Chaouni was the subject of a recent BBC Outlook podcast episode that focused on her upbringing in Fez, Morocco and on her return years later as a recently trained architect on an epic journey across the Sahara Desert.

Chaouni was the first Moroccan to study architecture at Harvard University, where her thesis advisor and mentor, Hashim Sarkis, encouraged her to pursue a project close to home—one inspired by social responsibility to a community versus a starchitect’s vision for a monumental building. 

In the end, Chaouni set out to restore the heavily polluted river that runs through Fez's ancient medina—and found her true calling in the process.

Listen to the episode.