Murillo building • Mabel Ubiria Center
Mabel embraced this project with great enthusiasm. She wished for people with disabilities and for many young people to find in this project a housing option that could provide them with the amenities needed to live safely and as equals, open to opportunities of personal development, autonomy and broad social participation. She chose this project on which to focus her boundless, golden energy.
Mabel was an architect with a degree from the School of Architecture of the Universidad de la Republica (Uruguay), with a Master´s Degree in Integration of Disabled Persons from the University of Salamanca (Spain), a Doctor Honoris Causa from the School of Medicine of the Universidad de la República (Uruguay), but above all this she was a wonderful human being. Mabel was born on November 29, 1931, and died in Montevideo on March 21, 2011.
From a very young age she became progressively disabled, and could not walk without assistance. We all remember her with profound affection and admiration, with the image of her wheelchair and how she managed to overcome this situation with fortitude and good spirit. She assumed her lifelong commitment in a way that will always live in our hearts. Mabel was and will always be a guide, a leader and without a doubt a shinning reference in the road towards a Uruguay devoid of architectural or social barriers that marginalize or create inequalities for disabled persons.
Mabel was and continues to be an example to others. She was able to transmit her message with great fortitude and intelligence, but also with deep inner joy and peace, always committed to her valiant and unwavering ethical stance in the struggle to build a physical medium for social and cultural equality.
With admirable strength and willpower, but also with great affection, she always took a bold contemporary stance and always with the highest commitment.
Those of us that have felt inspired by her dedication, her solidarity, her joy and her optimism, that have had the privilege to accompany her for more than three decades on the path towards the integration of persons in a more accessible and inclusive society, have wished for this project to be distinguished by her name.
Jorge Galíndez, Eduardo Alvarez
