Celebrating Architectural Excellence in the Americas. 2025 MCHAP Finalists

Tatiana Bilbao (Mexico City, 1972). Graduated from Architecture and Urbanism at Universidad Iberoamericana in 1996, in 1998 she won honorable mention for her career and also appreciation for the best thesis of the year. Advisor for Urban Projects at the Urban Housing and Development Department of Mexico City in 1998-99. As advisor for the government, Tatiana was member of the urban council of the city.

In 1999 co-founds LCM S.C. In 2004 starts Tatiana Bilbao S.C. with projects in China, Spain, France and Mexico. Also in 2004 founds MXDF along with architects Derek Dellekamp, Arturo Ortiz and Michel Rojkind. MXDF is an urban research center, attending the production of space, its occupation, its defense and control in Mexico City.

In 2005 becomes design professor at Universidad Iberoamericana. Awarded with the Design Vanguard for one of the top 10 emerging firms of the year in 2007 by Architecture Record. Visiting professor at Andres Bello University in Santiago de Chile in Autumn 2008. Named as Emerging Voice by the Architecture League of NY in 2009.

In 2010 two partners joined David Vaner and Catia Bilbao. In December 2010 three projects where acquired by the Centre George Pompidou in Paris, France to be part of their Architectural Permanent Collection. Critics in universities such as Techknik Munich, MIT, UPenn, ETH etc. Spring semester 2013 she is visiting professor at FH Düsseldorf, Germany.

adamo-faiden. Architecture practice was established in Buenos Aires in 2005 by Sebastián Adamo (1977) and Marcelo Faiden (1977). They are architects from the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) and PhD from the School of Architecture of Barcelona (UPC). They have been working as partners since 2000, and in 2005 they founded Adamo-Faiden, starting their journey from the centre of Buenos Aires. They are professors at the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) and the University of Palermo (UP).

Their work includes the field of teaching and research and has been internationally recognised by different media and institutions. His works have been exhibited at the Sao Paulo Architecture Biennial, the Guggenheim Museum in New York, the Venice Architecture Biennial, the Chicago Architecture Biennial, the LIGA Architecture Gallery in Mexico, the Deutsches Architekturmuseum in Frankfurt, the Storefront for Art & Architecture in New York, and at the Princeton University School of Architecture.

Seven monographic publications have compiled adamo-faiden’s work, including a+u 2024:10. “Adamo-Faiden” Selective Memory; Revista 2G Nº91. adamo-faiden: International Architecture (Editorial Walther & Franz König); Inventory (Actar, Barcelona, ​​Spain); “Adamo-Faiden. El constructor contemporáneo. 2007-2018” (TC Prospectiva, Valencia, Spain); “Adamo-Faiden. 2007/2017” (Casa editrice Libria, Melfi, Italy); 2G ​​Magazine Nº65 “Adamo-Faiden” (Editorial Gustavo Gili, Barcelona, ​​Spain); and Monographic Book “Adamo-Faiden” (ARQ Editions, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Chile). In 2019, Agustín Fiorito became an associate architect of the firm, inaugurating at the same time the headquarters of adamo-faiden in Montevideo, Uruguay.

Sebastián Adamo is an architect from the University of Buenos Aires (FADU-UBA) and has a master's degree from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (ETSAB-UPC). He has been a visiting professor at the School of Architecture of Princeton University, the Polytechnic University of Milan, FADU-UBA and Torcuato Di Tella University. He has also been a guest lecturer at numerous institutions, such as the Canadian Center for Architecture, the Harvard Graduate School of Design, the Porto School of Architecture, the Polytechnic University of Milan, the RIBA in London, the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, the École Polytechnique Fédérale in Lausanne, the Polytechnic School of Architecture in Madrid, the University of Talca and the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile.

Marcelo Faiden is an architect from the University of Buenos Aires (FADU-UBA) with an honours degree and a master's degree from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (ETSAB-UPC). He received his doctorate (ETSAB-UPC) with his thesis "The ground floors of tall buildings". He is Dean of the Faculty of Architecture and Urban Studies at the Torcuato Di Tella University. He was a visiting professor at the Faculty of Architecture at Princeton University, FADU-UBA, University of Palermo, and Torcuato Di Tella University. He has been invited to give courses and lectures at numerous institutions such as the Canadian Center for Architecture, the School of Architecture of Madrid, the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, the School of Architecture of Valencia, the Escola da Cidade de Sao Paulo, the Faculty of Architecture, Design and Urbanism of the University of Montevideo and the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile.

5468796 Architecture. It is a 12-person architectural studio based in Winnipeg, Manitoba, in the middle of Canada, which, by their own admission, is a remote and conservative place, where it is difficult to convince people of the value of architecture and the project. However, today, a group of ten new studios are challenging the status quo and helping to revive the modern legacy created by the disciples of Wright, Mies and Gropius, who came to the region in the 60s and 70s to help turn the Department of Architecture at the University of Manitoba into one of the most solid modern schools in Canada. 

However, as the studio's founder, Sasa Radulovic, says, "In the last 20 years, the scene has been relatively stagnant," so they propose a renaissance in perspective and in everything they do, from practical teaching to public participation, seeking to raise the profile of architecture. 

Over the years, we have come to understand that the role of the architect requires a more holistic view of practice, and design advocacy is part of this ongoing quest. 5468796 has become a platform for engagement through practice, exhibitions, events and activism, and for the dissemination of knowledge through symposia, teaching and publications.

Marlon Blackwell Architects is an architecture firm based in Fayetteville, Arkansas, United States, founded in 1990 that advocates a participatory and collaborative design process between the client, contractors and architect, where all voices are heard from conceptualization to execution. realization of each project.

Marlon Blackwell,, FAIA co-founded the University of Arkansas Mexico Summer Urban Studio in 1994 and coordinated and taught in the Casa Luis Barragán program in Mexico City since 1996. He received his bachelor's degree from Auburn University in 1980 and an M. Arch degree II from Syracuse University in Florence in 1991.

He serves as Distinguished Professor and Department Head in the School of Architecture at the University of Arkansas. Working outside the architectural mainstream, his architecture is based in design strategies that celebrate vernaculars, that draw upon them, and that seek to transgress conventional boundaries for architecture.  Work produced in his professional office, Marlon Blackwell Architect, has received national and international recognition, numerous AIA design awards and significant publication in books, architectural journals and magazines including Architectural Record (with the honor of having the Keenan TowerHouse featured on the cover of the February 2001 issue), Architect, Arquine, A+U, Detail, Dwell, Metropolitan Home, Contract, Residential Architect, the Phaidon Atlas of Contemporary Architecture (2004 & 2008) and Architectural Review (2002 ar + d prize winner for the Moore HoneyHouse and a 2010 Housing Citation for the PorchDog House).

"For Blackwell, buildings are generators of and frames for experience. Profound and touching architectural experiences arise from the tectonic realities of construction, truthful materiality, and the existential charge of the imagery, not from fictitious pictorial fabrications." 

Juhani Pallasmaa

The significance of his contributions to design is evidenced by the publication of a monograph of his work entitled “An Architecture of the Ozarks: The Works of Marlon Blackwell” published by Princeton Architectural Press in 2005. Marlon was selected by The International Design Magazine, in 2006, as one of the ID Forty: Undersung Heroes and as an “Emerging Voice” in 1998 by the Architectural League of New York.

At the University of Arkansas he has co-taught design studios with Peter Eisenman (1997 & 1998), Christopher Risher (2000) and Julie Snow (2003). He has been a visiting professor teaching graduate design at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts in Spring 2001 and 2002.  Most recently, he was the Elliel Saarinen Visiting Professor at the University of Michigan. He also has served as the Ivan Smith Distinguished Professor at the University of Florida (Spring 2009) and the Paul Rudolph Visiting Professor at Auburn University (Spring 2008) and the Cameron Visiting Professor at Middlebury College (Fall 2007). In the Spring of 2003, he was the Ruth and Norman Moore Visiting Professor at Washington University in St. Louis and has also been a visiting professor at Syracuse University (1991-92).