U. Tan Than was born in Burma (now Myanmar) and educated at Rangoon University, where the country’s first architecture degree programmed had just opened in 1954. Graduating in 1958 Tan Than was one of the initial batch of five students to graduate. After working for several months in the practice of Sithu U Tin, before focusing on public housing projects. In 1965 he travelled to the UK, where he enrolled on the ‘General Course’ of the Architectural Association’s Department of Tropical Studies. He successfully completed the course and was awarded a Tropical Diploma, his final project being on the topic of hospital ward designs in tropical regions. U Tan Than then remained in the London for around one year, gaining further experience as an architectural assistant at the UK Ministry of Health. By 1969 he had returned to Burma, where he set himself up as a specialist in hospital design, his first major project being the Yangon Children’s Hospital, which was designed and constructed between 1970-1978. The majority of his career was spent in the Public Works Department but in the 1980s he became involved with the UNICEF programme for Primary School Development.
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