His projects and works have been selected in international exhibitions as On-Site, organized by MoMa of New York (2006); the Spanish Architecture Biennale (1993-1994 and 2010-2011), and in the Spanish Pavilion of the 15th and 7th Biennale di Architettura di Venice (2000 and 2016), being distinguished in both occasions with the Golden Lion of the Biennale, among other exhibitions. Has been nominated for the Mies van der Rohe Prizes (2007), won the Enor Award (2011) and gained Architecture recognition in the XI Bienal de Arquitectura y Urbanismo Española, and the award of the VIII Bienal Iberoamericana de Arquitectura y Urbanismo (2011). He won the first prize, in collaborating with Álvaro Siza, in the international competition of the “Atrio de la Alhambra”.

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His book, La Tradición Innovada. Escritos sobre Regresión y Modernidad, published by Arquia Foundation, has won the FAD award of Thought and Criticism 2014. He is co-director of the XIII Spanish Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism and Spanish delegate for the X Iberoamericana Bienal of Architecture and Urbanism. His studio is located in the tower of an old sugar Factory in Granada, a place that has conditioned their understanding of the relationship between architecture and heritage, and an activity that time has emerged as a rescue of this abandoned industrial precinct.​

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He has been an invited professor in several schools of architecture: Lausanne Polytechnic, Switzerland; Lisbon School of Architecture, Portugal; Fach Hochschule Lausitz de Cottbus, Germany; Fakultät Architektur an der Technischen Universität Dresden, Germany; Faculty of Architecture and Interior Design, San Francisco de Quito, Ecuador; Columbia University, New York, USA; School of Art, Architecture and Design de Guadalajara (Mexico); AAI, Architectural Association of Ireland, Dublin (Ireland); Navarra School of Architecture (Spain), Barcelona School of Architecture (Spain) and Madrid School of Architecture (Spain).

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He is moved by a natural restlessness about knowledge that is not exclusively scientific neither artistic, enjoying to risk unprecedented links and developing an activity that does not distinguish between oeuvre and biography.

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- Brief Showcase -

Gonçalo Byrne studied architecture at the Escola Superior de Belas Artes de Lisboa and is Doctor Honoris Causa from the Technical University of Lisbon and the University of Alghero. He has been invited professor in several universities such as the University of Coimbra, the École Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne, the Università IUAV di Venezia, the Accademia di Architettura di Mendrisio, the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Harvard University, the Politecnico di Milano and the University of Alghero.

He is principal at Gonçalo Byrne Arquitectos, with an extensive work both in terms of scale, program and context, including urban planning and building design, urban renewal and project management such as the renewal of the Banco de Portugal headquarters (with João Pedro Falcão de Campos), the renewal of the Thalia Theatre in Lisbon (with Barbas Lopes Arquitectos), the renewal of the Machado de Castro National Museum in Coimbra, the renewal of the Trancoso Castel and the renewal of the Santa Maria Abbey surroundings in Alcobaça.

He has received an AICA/SEC Award, the Gold Medal from France’s Académie d’architecture Française, and the 2014 Piranesi Prix de Rome for the Machado de Castro renewal.

Joan Busquets is an architect, urban planner and professor of urban planning and design at the GSD, Harvard University since 2002 and previously at the Escola Tècnica Superior d'Arquitectura de Barcelona. He is the founder of LUB Barcelona and was the head of urban planning for the Barcelona City Council in the preparations for the Barcelona Olympics. He is author of urban projects in The Hague, Delft, Geneva, Rotterdam, Toledo, Lisbon and Toulouse among others around the world like Singapore, Shanghai, Ningbo and Sao Paulo. He was awarded with the Paris Grand Prix Spécial de l'Urbanisme and the Erasmus Prize.

He has published many books, including L’Urbanització marginal (1999); Toledo y su futuro/ Toledo and its Future (2000); Barcelona, Ciutat Vella: un pasado con futuro (2003); Bringing the Harvard Yards to the River (2004); Six projects for Downtown's Den Haag (2004); Barcelona: the Urban Evolution of a Compact City (2005); New Orleans. Strategies for a City in Soft Land (2005); A Coruña: a nova ciudade marítima no porto/A Coruña: a maritime city in the port (2006); Cities X-Lines: A new lens for the urbanistic project (2007); Cerdà and the Barcelona of the future, Reality Versus Design (2009); Maastricht Urban Surplus (2009); Shenzhen Designing the non-stop transformation city (2010); Spoorzone Delft-Railway Zone Public Space Design (2010); Joan Busquets - City in layers - Erasmus prize 2011 (2011); Niewe centrum, Nesselande, Roterdam (2011); Dunkerke projet de réaménagent du centre-ville (2012); Innovative Boulevards in Lisbon (2013); World Architecture Magazine n º 272 WA - Designing Urban Architecture: Joan Busquets+BAU/BLAU (2013); Barcelona: the Urban Evolution of a Compact City (2014); and Toulouse - Identité et partage du centre-ville (2014).

Rem Koolhaas (Rotterdam, 1944) founded OMA in 1975 together with Elia and Zoe Zenghelis and Madelon Vriesendorp. He graduated from the Architectural Association in London and in 1978 published Delirious New York: A Retroactive Manifesto for Manhattan. In 1995, his book S,M,L,XL summarized the work of OMA in "a novel about architecture". He heads the work of both OMA and AMO, the research branch of OMA, operating in areas beyond the realm of architecture such as media, politics, renewable energy and fashion. Koolhaas is a professor at Harvard University where he conducts the “Project on the City”. In 2014, he was the director of the 14th International Architecture Exhibition of the Bienale di Venezia, entitled "Fundamentals".

João Luís Carrilho da Graça received a degree in architecture from the Lisbon School of Fine Art in 1977, the year when he began his professional activity.

He was nominated and/or selected for the Mies van der Rohe European Prize in Architecture (1990, 1992, 1994, 1996, 2009, 2011, 2013 and 2015), and has received a number of awards. These include: the Secil Prize for Architecture (1994) for the Lisbon School of Communication and Media Studies; the Valmor Prize (1998) and the FAD Prize (1999) for the Knowledge of the Seas Pavilion; the Valmor Prize (2008) for the Lisbon School of Music; the Piranesi Prix de Rome (2010) for the Musealization of the archaeological site of the Praça Nova at St. George’s Castle; the Frate-Sole International Sacred Architecture Prize (2012) for the Church of Santo António in Portalegre; and the AIT Award 2012 - Transportation (2012) for the Carpinteira Footbridge. He has also won various awards for the ensemble of his oeuvre, such as: International Art Critics Award (1992), Order of Merit of the Portuguese Republic (1999), Pessoa Prize (2008), Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres from the French Republic (2010), and the Medal of the Académie d’Architecture of France (2012).

He was assistant lecturer at the Lisbon School of Fine Art (1977-1992), full professor at the Autonomous University of Lisbon (2001-2010) and the University of Évora (2005-2013). He coordinated the departments of Architecture in both institutions until 2010, and was responsible for the creation of the Doctorate in Architecture at the latter institution, which he also directed (2011-2013). He was visiting professor at the Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura of the Universidad de Navarra (2005, 2007, 2010 and 2014) and at the College of Architecture, Art, and Planning of Cornell University, in New York (2015). Since 2014, he has been Full Professor at the School of Architecture, University of Lisbon. He has also been invited to seminars and conferences in various international universities and institutions.

In 2013, he received an Honorary Doctorate degree from the School of Architecture of the University of Lisbon and in 2015 he received the Royal Institute of British Architects International Fellowship and was made Honorary Member of the Association of Portuguese Architects.

João Gomes da Silva graduated in landscape-architecture from the Universidade de Évora in 1987 and lectured there as an assistant professor. He is a professor at the Accademia di Architettura di Mendrisio (USI) and at Architecture Department of the Universidade Autónoma de Lisboa. He was visiting professor at GSD Harvard, last fall semester 2015. He has also been invited to lecture in several other universities and has participated in conferences and workshops within the scope of landscape architecture and landscape, both nationally and internationally. In 1997, he founded the Global Landscape Architecture with Inês Norton, creating a group that generates landscape theory and space, from the interpretation of the economic, social and contemporary cultural transformations. He has dedicated his professional life, individually or in collaboration, to the critical production of Landscape-Architecture.

His works have been distinguished with several awards including the Schinkel Prize in landscape architecture with Inês Norton and João Mateus, the Portuguese Design Centre Prize for the public spaces of the Expo'98 precinct, the Valmor Prize for the Expo'98 project in co-authorship with the Architect Manuel Salgado, the FAD Award, the International Stone Architecture Award and the audience award in the 5th Landscape Biennial for the Salinas Landscape project in Madeira, in co-authorship with the Architect Paulo David, the Red Dot – design Award, the SEGD - Merit Award, the D&AD Award and the European Design Awards for the Cycling Track - Belém_Cais do Sodré segment, in co-authorship with Atelier P06 and the Piranesi Award for the project of the São Jorge Castle, in co-authorship with the Architect João Luís Carrilho da Graça.

Anne Lacaton graduated from l’École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Bordeaux in 1980. She was a visiting professor at the University of Madrid, at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in 2004, 2006 and 2010-11, and at the Graduate School of Design of Harvard University in 2011 and 2015.

Jean Philippe Vassal also graduated from l’École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Bordeaux in 1980. He worked as an urban planner in Niger from 1980 to 1985. He has taught at the Universität der Künste Berlin since 2012 and has been a visiting professor at the Technische Universität Berlin from 2007 to 2010 and at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in 2010/11.

Based in Paris, the office Lacaton & Vassal has an international practice, working on various programs of public buildings, housing and urban planning such as the Contemporary Art Center in Dunkerque, the Palais de Tokyo - Site for Contemporary Creation in Paris, the Nantes School of Architecture, the Latapie House in Bordeaux, the "Cité Manifeste" in Mulhouse and the transformation of the modernist social housing Tour Bois le Prêtre in Paris. Their projects are based on a principle of generosity and economy, serving the life, the uses and the appropriation, with the aim of changing the standard.

They were distinguished with several awards, such as Rolf Schock Prize, the Grand Prix National d’Architecture, the International Fellowship of the RIBA and the Prix de l’Equerre d'Argent. They were also appointed twice as finalists for the Mies Van der Rohe Award. Their work was recently published in El Croquis, 177-178 (2015); AV, Arquitectura Viva 170 (2014); 2G n° 60 (2012); A+U n°498 (2007).

Winfried Brenne graduated in architecture from the University of Wuppertal and the Technische Universität Berlin. From 1976 to 1990 he worked together with Helge Pitz. In 1990 he founded the Winfried Brenne Architekten office and in 2002 he founded the Brenne Architekten Gesellschaft von Architekten mbH together with Franz Jaschke. His practice’s key projects include the reconstruction, restoration and alterations of precious monuments (UNESCO World Heritage Site, historic and public buildings), conceptual work, expert reports of solitaires/monument districts, sustainable and ecological construction. From 1990 to 1992 he taught at TFH Berlin (the present Beuth University of Applied Sciences). He was a member of the Council for the Preservation of Historic Buildings and Monuments in Berlin (1996-1999), on the advisory board for the committee for the reconstruction of the Bauhaus in Dessau (1995-1999), and chairman of the Stiftung Denkmalschutz Heritage Foundation in Berlin (2000-2002). He has been a member of the ICOMOS German National Committee since 2000; of the Federal Foundation for Baukultur (the Potsdam-based organization dedicated to the quality of the built environment) since 2005; and of the Berlin Academy of Arts since 2006. Brenne was a founding member of docomomo Germany.

In 2008 he received the WMF-Knoll-Modernism-Prize from the World Monuments Fund for the rebuilding of the former Federal School of ADGB, in Bernau, Germany. In 2014 he was awarded the Heinrich-Tessenow Medaille in recognition of his life’s work. He is an author, lecturer, and designer of exhibitions. His published works include Bruno Taut: Master of Colourful Architecture in Berlin (2008).

Adam Caruso graduated in architecture from McGill University in Montreal. He worked for Florian Beigel and Arup Associates before establishing his own practice with Peter St John in 1990. He taught at the University of North London from 1990-2000, and was professor at the University of Bath from 2002-2005. He has been visiting professor at the Academy of Architecture in Mendrisio, at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University, at the ETH Zurich, and on the Cities Programme at the London School of Economics. In 2011 Adam Caruso was appointed Professor of Architecture and Construction at the ETH Zurich.

Peter St John began his architectural studies at the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London, completing them at the Architectural Association in 1984. He worked for Richard Rogers, Florian Beigel, Dixon Jones, and Arup Associates prior to establishing his own practice with Adam Caruso. He taught at the University of North London from 1990-2000. He was a visiting professor at the Academy of Architecture in Mendrisio, Switzerland from 1999-2001, and in the Department of Architecture and Civil Engineering at the University of Bath from 2001-2004. In 2005 he was a visiting critic at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University. From 2007 to 2009 he was a visiting professor at ETH in Zurich. He is currently an external examiner at the Scott Sutherland School of Architecture in Aberdeen and Cardiff School of Architecture, and is a visiting professor at London Metropolitan University.

Josep Maria Montaner graduated in architecture and holds a PhD from the Escola Tècnica Superior d'Arquitectura de Barcelona where he is a senior professor of “Theory of Architecture”. From June 2015 he is a deputy on housing in the Barcelona Town Council.

He is the author of several books including Después del movimiento moderno. Arquitectura de la segunda mitad del siglo XX (1993); Arquitectura y crítica (1999); Museos para el siglo XXI (2003); Sistemas arquitectónicos contemporâneos (2008); La modernidad superada. Ensayos sobre arquitectura contemporânea (2011); Arquitectura y política (with Zaida Muxí, 2011); and La arquitectura de la vivienda colectiva. Políticas y proyectos en la ciudad contemporânea (2015). He is regular contributor to Spanish newspaper EL PAIS and he writes for international reviews of Architecture. Previously he was visiting lecturer at the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London and scholar at the Spanish Academy in Rome. He has taught courses and given lectures in Europe, America and Asia. In 2005 he was awarded by the Spanish Government’s National Prize on Urbanism.

Rui Alexandre obtained a scholarship from Jacksonville State University (U.S.A.) in 1981 and studied architecture at the University of Lisbon, graduating in 1987. He also earned a post-graduate degree in planning at the NOVA University. Since 1991, he has been the head architectural and planning advisor for APL, the Administration of the Port of Lisbon. In 2010, he became president of the southern chapter of the Portuguese Order of Architects. Rui Alexandre has collaborated with prominent architects Manuel Graça Dias (in 1987), Gunnel and Eric Adlercreutz e Hasse Hãgerstrõm (A-Konsultit, Arkkitehtitoimisto in 1987 and 1988), Fernando Sanchez Salvador and Margarida Grácio Nunes (in 1991), and João Santa-Rita and José Daniel Santa-Rita (in 1991). He came 3rd in the competition for the Portuguese Pavilion at the Seville World’s Fair (Expo ‘92), and in 1998, he and architect Márcio Luiz won the competition for the Algerian Pavilion at Expo ‘98 in Lisbon.