In the sixth episode of the second season of the Knowledge Hub podcast, two architects help bridge the worlds of education and architecture. Marina Annus and Gábor Vörös discuss one of CÉH Zrt.’s major projects – the Biatorbágy Innovative Technical School and Secondary School, already familiar to regular readers and listeners – to illustrate how architecture can support learning, community building, and collaboration. Moreover, in an intriguing thought experiment, the guests imagine how they would redesign a typical Hungarian public school building if their own children were studying there.

Architects with a broad perspective

Marina Annus graduated from the Faculty of Architecture at BME, then gained several years of international professional experience, including in New York. Since 2004 she has been an architect at CÉH Zrt., today head of the CÉH Engineering studio and a vice president of the company. Since returning to Hungary, she has applied her international experience in several school projects abroad as well. Gábor Vörös joined CÉH’s architectural team in 2017 after six years of work in Austria. He also has substantial experience in designing educational buildings; for example, as lead designer he oversaw parts of the design works of the BOSCH Campus. Both place particular emphasis on a holistic professional approach, dedicating significant attention to understanding the client’s professional priorities—something they illustrated vividly and comprehensively in the Csomópont studio.

“When we look at a building, it should make a statement!”

Marina was quick to point out that the brief provided by any client cannot be reduced to a simple room schedule. Spatial relationships are often more important than individual rooms: it’s not only what happens in a given room that matters, but also how it fits with other spaces and what kinds of connections it creates between people. A good brief therefore also contains a vision and principles, and starts from the following question: What feeling will users have when they enter the building? Put more rationally, the building must immediately say something to its audience.

Some of their guiding principles in the design process may be surprising. Gábor emphasised that in the initial phase it’s forbidden to pick up a pencil; instead, the architect’s task is to think all day: be present on site, understand the local context, search for the right solution through countless sketches—and even allow and incorporate ideas that arrive outside working hours.

Individual and group learning for shared goals

In fine-tuning their designs, Marina and Gábor draw extensively on external examples—a practice deeply embedded in their organisation’s culture. At CÉH, openness to learning is a core value: new colleagues are selected through a multi-step process, the team regularly analyses good practices from Hungary and abroad in in-house workshops, and they frequently participate in international study visits. Northern (Danish, Finnish, and British) examples inspire them just as much as German and Austrian solutions.

Professional and linguistic development is consciously supported, yet it always serves the team as a whole—collaboration and project quality come before individual recognition. Maintaining order and structure is equally vital: as in schools, where learners perform better in organised environments, so do colleagues in the workplace. Gábor highlighted clarity, innovation, and transparency as their key values. Still, he sees CÉH primarily as a large family—a shared space of knowledge, experience, and human connection.

Innovative design for strong school communities

The Biatorbágy Innovative Technical School and Secondary School (BIT)—introduced in detail earlier this season—stands as a landmark project for both guests. Marina described it as one of her favourite works; for Gábor, it was a career milestone. As he emphasised, the goal was not to win awards with spectacular design features but to ensure client satisfaction and create a school that truly serves its students.

From the beginning, it was clear they had been commissioned to design something unique in Hungary. The school’s leadership provided clear principles and detailed input, enabling the architects to imagine the world of the future school and develop a fitting concept. Importantly, the CÉH team also sought to involve the newly forming teaching staff in the design process.

The architects prepared multiple concept options, giving the client a genuine choice. They deliberately moved away from the traditional “corridor and classroom” layout, adopting instead an American-style cluster system. This approach allows spaces to better adapt to students’ daily needs and the school’s project-based pedagogy. The final plan features a comb-shaped structure organised around an internal atrium, with abundant natural light and multifunctional layouts. Classrooms of around 75 m² are nearly square rather than elongated, enabling flexible use. Western European examples provided valuable inspiration—especially in spatial connectivity, which remains a novelty in Hungarian school design.

Learning extends beyond the classrooms: the garden serves as an outdoor classroom, lounge areas encourage informal learning and socialisation, and the sports grounds host movement-based community experiences. The entire building thus becomes an active part of the learning process.

The collaboration between the school and the architects did not end with the handover. After the first academic year, they held a retrospective workshop to evaluate lessons learned, and CÉH architects also gave a sustainability-themed lecture during the school’s project week.

The future of Hungarian schools through an architect’s eyes

Toward the end of the episode, the discussion turned to how Hungary’s public school buildings could be improved. Gábor stressed the need for new standards to replace those from the 1980s, and greater flexibility from authorities—noting, for example, that they were prohibited from installing washable, non-flammable carpet flooring. Since the challenges of the future are not yet fully known, buildings must be designed to adapt easily.

Marina pointed out that most school buildings are rigid and compartmentalised, with cramped classrooms. Their renewal is primarily a state and institutional responsibility, yet meaningful change must begin with dialogue among all stakeholders, including the architectural profession. Developing innovative concepts could be encouraged through design competitions and grant programmes.

When asked what kind of school they would design for their own children, both architects highlighted familiar elements from the BIT project: abundant natural light, pleasant materials, easily accessible green spaces, and calming colours. They stressed the importance of both communal and solitary spaces, and the need for students to internalise a sense of order—by creating and maintaining it themselves.

Messages and reflections

The guests also shared a message for teachers: “Don’t start from the school of your own childhood—build the school of the future.” They encourage openness to external and international practices, collaboration, and thinking beyond conventional boundaries. For school leaders, their advice is to choose an architect who shares their educational vision.

At the time of recording, Marina and Gábor were both working on new educational projects—designing a kindergarten, a nursery, and a university R&D centre. More information about their work and the studio can be found on the CÉH Zrt. website.

Members of this episode:

Marina Annus, Vice President and Lead Architect at CÉH Zrt.

Marina Annus graduated from the Faculty of Architecture at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics (BME) as a German architecture student, where her final diploma work received a special university award. After graduation, she settled in Hungary and is the mother of two children. She was admitted to the two-year Master School of the Association of Hungarian Architects, and later taught as an external lecturer at BME’s Departments of Urban Planning and Industrial Design. She also serves as a member of the English-language Diploma Jury for architectural education at BME.

For several years, she was a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Hungarian Chamber of Architects, and she remains a member of both the Association of Hungarian Architects and the Hungarian Chamber of Architects. To broaden her professional and managerial vision, she complemented her engineering education with an MBA degree.

Marina also gained international professional experience, spending three years in New York with her family, where she worked as an architect at Robert A.M. Stern Architects. After returning to Hungary, she applied her international experience in school design projects of international scope. Since 2004, she has been an architect at CÉH Zrt., where she currently leads the CÉH Mag Architecture Studio. She has served as lead architect for several large-scale industrial, residential, and sports projects—many of them conducted in foreign languages. Across all projects, she consistently upholds high architectural quality and precision. Her work has been featured in professional exhibitions, publications, and forums, and several of her buildings have received construction industry excellence awards.

Marina considers it her mission to mentor the younger generation, share her experience as widely as possible, and foster a strong, cohesive architectural team built on professional excellence and trust.

Gábor Vörös, Lead Architect at CÉH Zrt.

Gábor Vörös earned his college and university degrees in architecture from the Széchenyi István University in Győr. Since 2004, he has contributed to the design of smaller-scale buildings, later gaining six years of experience in Austria, where he worked at a Vienna-based architectural firm involved in the comprehensive design of wineries, community buildings, and villas.

He joined the CÉH architecture team in 2017, where he focuses mainly on the design of industrial, educational, and research & development facilities. Among his notable works is leading the architectural design of a two-storey, glass-clad, green-roof pedestrian bridge built for BOSCH.

For me, the conceptual and holistic architectural approach is essential. This mindset ensures that the design process follows clear and consistent principles, extending to the work of all engineering disciplines. It serves as the guiding framework—from the masterplan concept down to the detailed construction drawings.

Bertalan Péter Farkas, editor-in-chief of Knowledge Hun podcast, managing director of Learnitect Design Ltd.

Knowledge manager, knowledge management consultant, trainer, project manager, but originally a teacher of geography and history. In his day job, he works as a professional director for one of the largest educational technology companies in the region, as a knowledge manager for education and digital transformation, and as an entrepreneur he is a lover of learning environments and knowledge transfer. After a few years of teaching, he worked for government agencies (Educatio, EMET, Tempus) and headed the Knowledge Management team of the Tempus Public Foundation for almost 6 years. As Managing Director of Learnitect Design Ltd. he is involved in knowledge management and design of learning environments for knowledge transfer, online and offline learning management, design of community spaces and international project management. He conceived the idea for the Node podcast in 2022, which finally became a reality in autumn 2023.