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BUILD MANITOBA     winnipegconstruction.ca
IMPACT BUILDERS
P
riscila Calderon greets you the way 
she greets everyone: with a kiss on 
the cheek, a bright smile and the kind 
of warmth that makes you feel seen. But 
behind that warmth is a woman who has 
rebuilt her life from the ground up.
Working as a lawyer in Ecuador’s 
construction industry, Calderon built 
her early career not behind a desk 
but on jobsites. Architects, engineers 
and tradespeople came to her with 
questions, and she would review the 
contracts, quantities and scope, and 
work with the client to find a solution.
“On paper, things are one way,” 
Calderon says. “On site, construction is 
not perfect. I loved connecting the legal 
side with the practical side.”
Then safety concerns in Ecuador began 
escalating. With two young children, 
Calderon and her husband, Eduardo 
Juarez, made the difficult decision 
to follow in her sister’s footsteps and 
immigrate to Canada. She arrived first, 
preparing a home in Winnipeg while 
enrolling as an international student at 
the University of Manitoba. At the same 
time, she confronted an unexpected 
challenge: language.
“When you live outside an English-
speaking country, you think you speak 
English,” she says. “When you arrive, you 
realize you need to learn again.”
By day, she studied and improved her 
English. By night, she and Juarez began 
rebuilding their construction careers – 
this time with their own hands. For six 
months, they worked overnight shifts 
grinding concrete and installing epoxy 
floors, often from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. When 
exhaustion caught up with them, they 
took turns sleeping in their truck before 
returning to the machines.
“It was hard physically,” she says. 
“But it was one of the most wonderful 
experiences of my life. We were  
building something.”
That “something” would eventually 
become Umina Flooring Solutions.
The company grew the way many 
small construction businesses do: one 
relationship at a time. In an industry built 
on trust, Calderon learned quickly that 
technical skill alone was not enough. 
A former construction lawyer 
turned flooring entrepreneur, 
Priscila Calderon is building 
careers and confidence for 
newcomers across Manitoba
By Twila Driedger
COMMUNITY CATALYST
PRISCILA 
CALDERON

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