Por Luis Miguel Pizano y Maru Pérez Benavides 


On Monday, November 16, 2020, Tatiana Bilbao presented her firm’s work to the Columbia GSAPP community, followed by a conversation with Enrique Walker. After this lecture, the LatinGSAPP team contacted Tatiana for an interview with Patio on December 16, 2020. We talked about big and small topics, and we reflected on contemporary architectural practice and themes of Alterity, domesticity, engagement, and honesty.


Maru Pérez Benavides (MP): It could be argued that the pandemic has made the contemporary need for redefining domestic space even more urgent. How do you think domestic spaces have evolved, both organically and systemically, in the context of a patriarchal Mexican culture? Domestic architecture in Mexico is associated with copious amounts of light and air, colorful patios, and large gathering spaces. How do these spaces change, and how do these spaces change us in a time when we spend all our time at home?

Tatiana Bilbao (TB): First of all, I’m glad you add the point that the subject of domesticity has only been addressed recently in a more urgent way. The COVID-19 pandemic has allowed us to recognize that the current social system relies on discrimination in order to survive.

The profound root of the problem is that the model of domesticity that we are pursuing 1) does not solve the right question and 2) reaffirms a framework of discrimination. It is kind of the cat biting its own tail! For example, we are developing housing models based on our current understanding of society, accepting private property as a given and accepting the nuclear family as a standard. In accepting the present conditions, we are creating a huge problem. These two elements depend on a framework of systemic discrimination, so it is going to be very tough to arrive at a solution for a dignified home if these models are present. Instead, we need to create life-scale models that are able to question the idea of private property and that are able to create possibilities of non-patriarchal relationships with the people in our domestic spaces.

In Mexico — as in the world — we have a model that perpetuates the ideas imposed and promoted by capitalism. The system of capitalism has permeated through the world, and it is implicit that for the system to survive, it needs to expand. The bad news is that this system is winning the battle. A hundred years ago, the majority of the population lived in small units with their own rules and possibilities of existing within the larger context. Today, if the population does not live in the same way, it is looking to live in the same way. This is a consequence of the capitalist system. It is ridiculous that if you ask someone in Sri Lanka what their ideal home is, they will likely imagine their house in a similar way as someone in North Dakota. These sites are not in the same context, same weather, same culture, same relationships, or same politics, etc. However, they both have the same dream of living in the existing system that perpetuates capitalism: the idea of the single-family house, in the single-family home, with two parents and two kids. I think it’s crazy because it is an unsustainable way of living.

We, as architects, have been compliant with the system and failed to question it. Before, we didn’t have the tools to question it as we do now, but, more importantly, the conversation has become more urgent. The system has not only created clear impositions on humans regarding how to live but a very bad imposition on the environment. This is not a sustainable system.

Luis Miguel Pizano (LM): Through the years, you’ve articulated the unique position in which many Mexican architects and designers find themselves — having to navigate a technocratic morass that requires specialized networks and expertise while equipped with very limited budgets, teams, and resources. How do you see this process being transformed in an age during which collectives and cooperatives have started to re-shape the landscape of practicing firms in Mexico? In your experience, what are the upsides of collective thinking, management, and execution? What are some of the downsides?

TB: I think there are many upsides and many downsides tocollective thinking. But if the downsides are big, the upsides are even bigger. Collective thinking is absolutely necessary. As humans, we have two basic necessities; 1) being nurtured, healthy, and fed and 2) having a roof over our heads. We could, if precariously, solve the roof situation individually, but we cannot nurture ourselves. We need relationships with others to grow mentally and spiritually. This is our core social necessity: the relationship with the other. To exist, we need the other. We are not able to fulfill our two basic necessities as humans if we do not create social relationships, and while those relationships are always conflictive, those conflicts are necessary in order to create meaningful relationships. This is the core idea behind productivity in the collective. Personally, I don’t see myself working independently ever. I can’t. Ever since I started my career, collaboration and exchange have allowed me to produce work, and I have always seen great potential in developing work that relies on collective networks and possibilities.

MP: I am very familiar with the Botanical Garden in Culiacán. I certainly admire the architectural characteristics, but my favorite thing about the space is how naturally integrated it is to Culiacán and its people. How do you take full advantage of the regional and cultural characteristics of the local nature in each of your projects? How does working in Latin America differ from your projects in other countries?

TB: The Botanical Garden project has been key — a very specific moment when we could not impose our way of thinking because it was not the logic of the space. This approach sounds contradictory to what architecture is, but it has been a useful project approach that allows us to operate at different levels. We architects always tend to think that we know how to organize spaces and that we know how to enhance spaces for social interactions. Well, I don’t think that’s the case anymore! We know the same or less than the users of the space. Architects should provide technical tools or outside ideas. Architects can be a vehicle to allow people to see things a different way, but we cannot impose ideas. To do so is a colonizing act, a discriminative act.

I think that one of the key moments for the Culiacán Botanical Garden was when I suggested a yoga pavilion. People in the Botanical Garden reacted to that idea. Some people questioned it, and some people were a bit too excited by it, which is also suspicious. Then, one of the gardeners shared with me how beautiful the mornings were when people arrived to practice yoga, tai chi, or other classes. I kept thinking about this image, and then I realized: of course, adding a pavilion for these classes will kill the activity rather than enhance it. There would be issues with scheduling, teaching, and logistics, so it would kill the spontaneity of the activity. I finally understood that we should follow the existing logic of the people that use the space. It is impossible to arrive and design something for a new space without considering how architecture can become a platform to develop the lives of everyday users and develop their own possibility of space without imposing factors, models and conditions. Architecture can open channels to create those possibilities.

This brings me to the concept of Alterity. I have always tried to be “the other” in the design process. I have always put myself in the opposing position. Even though it is very difficult to do so, it is extremely necessary. It is important to place yourself in the position of “the other”... not the other colleague or peer but to understand the people to whom you cannot relate. Moreover, it is very relevant to understand the other, especially when working in a public space that is part of the urban tissue. The profound root of the problem is that the model of domesticity that we are pursuing does not solve the right question, and reaffirms a framework of discrimination.

Tatiana Bilbao Estudio, Botanical Garden, Culiacan, Mexico, 2012. Photo: Iwan Baan, 2013. Cortesy Tatiana Bilbao Estudio.

LP: LatinGSAPP is deeply interested in the power of translation as a tool for the communication of nuanced ideas. What is your advice to aspiring writers, designers, and thinkers working through and around the limitations of language? How can students working outside of the Latin American context connect to the many languages of the continent while rooted in an environment that offers very limited possibilities for engagement?

TB: Well, that’s the million-dollar question. I really cannot answer it [laughs]. It’s a beautiful question that touches on one of the subjects that I have been thinking about a lot: the use of language, one of the most important legacies of our time. This question relays a huge issue that needs to be urgently addressed: the possibility of using a language.

We have consistently flattened the possibility of using language in its full sense. Today, we see the shortening of language and the disuse of linguistic formalities. The misuse of language in mass media and social media has translated into a colloquial type of language in politics and in every other relationship that we have. This problematic relationship language a kind of openness in communication, which results in less understanding but which can reach a greater number of people. But what is arriving to those people?

Thinking about this problem is extremely important because we connect to others through the use of language. However, there are many people who do not seem to be interested in the language that others speak, like our president. If you don’t open yourself up to the possibility of understanding the language of the other, then we are not able to relate. This is what English — and the flattening possibility of one single language — does. One of the more important elements of understanding another culture is to understand its language.

LP: During your lecture at GSAPP, you also explained the ideological reframing that your practice, Tatiana Bilbao Estudio, is currently undergoing. For the past few months, the Tatiana Bilbao Estudio Instagram page has memorialized this process. Six black squares and a message of solidarity — in simple white text — highlight the studio’s interest in the “revalorization of that which we can do in our own communities to reduce discriminatory rifts.” What observations can you share with us regarding the challenges of this reframing in the context of a changing Mexican society, be it as a designer, as a business owner, or as a citizen?

TB: It has been a very transformative process for Tatiana Bilbao Estudio to start speaking internally. It urgently asks for a new way of doing things. It is a transformation that needs to be done from its core. We had always been questioning how we lay down the practice: what the system of equality is, discrimination, and everything that comes with the current system. We are trying to understand how to do it in a sustainable and honest way. That is the core of the organization: the hierarchy, salaries, responses to the current political/economical model, and the institutionalized system. We are trying to translate it to the decisions in the endeavors that we do. It is going to be impossible to complete this fully because we live within the system, but I would want to use my practice to open channels for social possibilities and to represent the work of each individual within the practice in the work that we do. We are reframing the office and opening possibilities of change, questioning who we work for and what we do. This process is very ambitious and difficult, to be completely honest. I want to find balance and no comfort. I do not want to be comfortable; I just want to be in a place that feels right.