Maestría en Urbanismo Próximo

Willy Müller is a Spanish-Argentinian architect and urbanist, with a PhD from the Università degli Studi di Genova (UNIGE). He is one of the founders of IAAC, where he created the Urban Sciences Lab. He co-directs the Maestría en Urbanismo Próximo and has led the X-Urban Design Studio of the Master in Advanced Architecture since 2003. Willy has co-authored several books, including Metapolis Dictionary of Advanced Architecture and Hipercatalunya.

In 1996, Willy founded WMA – Willy Müller Architects, winning multiple international competitions, including projects in St. Petersburg, the Puerto de Almería, and the Mercabarna Flower Market, which earned the International Real Estate Award for Best Public Services Building in Europe (2010).

From 2011 to 2015, Willy was the CEO of Barcelona Regional Agency, overseeing strategic planning and urban development. He has led major urban projects worldwide, including Dream City in the Dominican Republic, Vitoria Bay in Brazil, Moscow Agglomeration, and the Rio de Janeiro Metropolitan Master Plan (PDUI).

Manuel Gausa holds a PhD from ETSAB, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (2005), and has been a Full Professor of Architecture and Landscape Design at UNIGE-Università degli Studi in Genoa since 2014. He coordinates the ADD, PhD Architectural and Design Program, and directs the GIC-Lab, focusing on urban and territorial research.
As a Principal Partner and Co-Director of Gausa+Raveau actarquitectura since 2000, Manuel has made significant contributions to architecture, landscape, and urban design. He served as Dean of IAAC from 2012 to 2015 and was Vice-President of the Advisory Council for Sustainable Development (CADS) in Catalonia from 2008 to 2012.
Manuel has held various academic positions, including Professor of Design Projects Studio at UNIGE and Director of the Master Program “Intelligent Coast” at Fundació Politècnica de Catalunya. His involvement in urban development includes roles on the Consell Consultiu de l’Hàbitat Urbà and the Scientific Technical Committee of CRUIE.
He has been an influential figure in architecture since the 1990s, serving as President of Metropolis and Director of the magazine “Quaderns d’Arquitectura i Urbanisme.” A founding member of Actar Architecture and Actar Projects Editorials, Manuel is an author of several significant publications and was honored with the Médaille de l’Académie d’Architecture de France in 2000.

Mathilde Marengo is an Australian–French–Italian PhD Architect whose research focuses on contemporary urban phenomena, its integration with technology, and its implications for the future of the planet. In today’s critical environmental, social, and economic context, she explores how designers can address these challenges through circular and metabolic design.

She is the Urban Sciences Lab Director, Head of Studies, Co-director of the Master in Advanced Urban Planning & Data Analytics (formerly City & Technology), and a PhD Supervisor at IAAC. In this setting, she designs and tests innovative educational formats, promoting holistic, multi-disciplinary design approaches that emphasise materialisation and reframe design education in the Information Age.

Her work extends to National and EU-funded research projects, including URBiNAT, InnoChain ETN, and BUILD Solutions. Mathilde’s work has been published and exhibited internationally.

Jordi Vivaldi is a writer, philosopher and architectural theorist based in Vienna.

PhD Architect (IOUD, Austria) and PhD Philosopher cand. (EGS, Switzerland), Jordi is the author of the forthcoming book Limit-Space: Agency and Form in a Xenological World (Actar Publishers, 2021). His areas of research include 20th and 21st century’s theory of experimental architecture, art and technology, as well as various forms of Speculative Realism and New Materialism. His current field of investigation orbits around the notion of “limit” together with associated terms such as “finitude”, “determination” and “reduction”, both in its philosophical and architectural registers.

Jordi’s philosophical work focuses on constructing an ontology of limits within the framework of Speculative Realism, articulating the limit as an ontological territory of differential sameness and auto-referential difference. From an architectural perspective, Jordi’s research focuses on instrumentalizing the limit as a space of notational abundance associated with composite forms of agency.

Jordi is currently working as theory faculty and researcher in several international universities such as IaaC in Barcelona, UCL Bartlett in London, IOUD in Innsbruck and PROPUR in Buenos Aires. Besides his curatorial tasks as editor in chief of the architectural magazine IaaC Bits, his work has crystallised in several articles, essays and lectures. Jordi is also the co-author of the book The Threefold Logic of Advanced Architecture (Barcelona: Actar Publishers, 2020).

Alejandro Haiek Coll is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Genova, Man-made Geographies MA Studio Leader at Umeå School of Architecture (UMA), and Affiliate Researcher at RISE and the Arctic Research Center of Umeå University. He is the founder of the Laboratory of Experimental Applied Arts Lab-Pro-Fab and the Laboratory for Planetary Diplomacy.

His research explores planetary ecosystem services for the future, aiming to reorient life existence within established geopolitical territorial control. His project-based practice focuses on social and environmental re-engineering, investigating human geographies and self-governance as political forms of environmental diplomacy and territorial justice. With projects ranging from performances to large-scale public eco infrastructures, Haiek and his laboratory work cooperatively alongside an international and interdisciplinary research network, exploring infrastructural ecosystems and material excess. Their landscape interventions are transformative both socially and politically, from micro to macro scale. The projects open feedback loops between the different levels of knowledge, from designer to builder.

His area of expertise revolves around regenerative projects in fragile natural and social ecosystems, addressing civic deficits, including unrest, poverty, and inequality. His work straddles art, architecture, design, geography, engineering, and performance.

Salvador Rueda holds degrees in Biological Science and Psychology from the University of Barcelona, along with a diploma in Environmental Engineering from Spain’s Ministry of Industry and Energy and Spanish Research Universities. He also has a diploma in Energy Management from the Polytechnic University of Catalunya. Since its inception in 2000, he has served as the Director of the Ecologia Urbana Agency, focusing on urban ecology and sustainability.