Denis Hector, R.A., LEED AP, is an Associate Professor in the University of Miami School of Architecture with a secondary appointment in the Department of Civil, Architectural & Environmental Engineering. He received his B.Arch. from Cornell and his Masters from Penn. As a DAAD Fellow at the Institut fur Leichte Flaechentragwerke he conducted research in the laboratory of 2015 Pritzker Prize winner, Frei Otto. He has taught architectural design and structures at the University of Bath, Parsons, Columbia, and Penn. At UM, he has served as Director of Graduate Programs, Associate Dean in the School of Architecture, and co-chair of the Abess Center Ecosystem Science and Policy Faculty Advisory Board. He initiated the first National Science Foundation Hurricane Hazard Research Conference post-Andrew, edited Hurricane Hazard Mitigation, and participated in the Mississippi Renewal Forum Charrette after Hurricane Katrina, the Mississippi AIA Mississippi Building Code Workshop, the 2010 Haiti Charrette, and subsequent work in Haiti with colleagues in Partner in Health. He currently advises on lightweight structures, hazard mitigation building codes, and community resilience.
Jacob Brillhart’s research engages the creative search through drawing, painting and design. This ongoing curiosity focuses on the ever changing relationship between design and methods of representation and visualization. His scholarly investigation of the creative search is based on Le Corbusier’s travel drawings and into his architectural theories and built work. He teaches drawing courses in the Rome program, seminars on Le Corbusier and Theory of Architecture and the Environment, plus core and upper level research studios. This scholarly study influences his own built work through his office Jacob Brillhart Architect, P.A., which seeks to establish a dynamic building vocabulary drawn from place, culture and climate. As a licensed architect and LEED AP, Brillhart is also engaged in sustainable building practices and was honored with the 2009 AIA Miami Design Merit Award for his “Mechanical House” and 2010 AIA Design Excellence Award for the “Grass House”. In 2010, he was also nominated as a finalist for the Rome Prize in Architecture.
Adib Cure received a Bachelor of Architecture degree from the University of Miami and a Masters of Architecture in Urban Design degree from Harvard University. Upon graduation he went to work for the office of Machado & Silvetti, and in 2001 he established the firm of Cure & Penabad Architecture and Urban Design in Miami. The work of the office has received numerous awards including American Institute of Architects awards, state and local preservation awards, a National Congress for New Urbanism Award, and a Silver Medal prize at the 2010 Miami Biennale. Most recently, the firm was nominated as a finalist for the prestigious Marcus Corporation Architectural Prize for emerging architectural talent.
Carie Penabad is Associate Dean and Director of the Bachelor of Architecture program. Her research focuses on the study of Latin American urbanism and architecture, particularly gaining accurate data on informal settlements and their growing role in the shaping of the contemporary city. She is also a principal of CURE & PENABAD, based in Miami. The work of the firm ranges in scale from furniture to architecture and urban design, with a focus on the cultural relevance of architecture and its relationship to history, form, craft and type. The office has received 10 American Institute of Architects awards, state and local preservation awards, and has been featured in leading publications and blogs including DOMUS, ArchDaily, KooZA/rch, and Dezeen.
Penabad has taught at a variety of institutions including the Boston Architectural Center and Northeastern University; and in 2013 was the Louis I Kahn Visiting Assistant Professor at Yale University. She co-authored the book Marion Manley: Miami’s First Women Architect with historian Catherine Lynn (University of Georgia Press, 2010) and recently edited the book Call to Order: Sustaining Simplicity in Architecture (ORO publishers, 2017). Penabad received a Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Miami and a Masters of Architecture in Urban Design degree from Harvard University.
Jorge L. Hernandez, received a Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Miami in 1980 and a Master of Architecture from the University of Virginia in 1985. He then worked for Eisenman Roberton Architects and taught at The University of Virginia. In 1987 he joined the faculty of the University of Miami and established his firm. His work includes The Brickell Bridge in Miami, Florida; The Williamsburg James City County Courthouse in Williamsburg, Virginia, both secured by winning entries in international competitions; and The Coral Gables Museum, a LEED certified renovation and addition to a National Register 1939 Phineas Paiste building. He has lectured in the US and Europe, taught for the Prince of Wales Institute of Architecture and participated in numerous international symposia and conferences. His work has been published internationally.
Germane Barnes’ research and design practice investigates the connection between architecture and identity. Mining architecture’s social and political agency, he examines how the built environment influences black domesticity. Currently, he is an Assistant Professor and Director of the Community Housing Identity Lab (CHIL) at the University Of Miami School Of Architecture. He is the 2021 Harvard GSD Wheelwright Prize winner, Rome Prize Fellow and winner of the Architectural League Prize. His design and research contributions have been published and exhibited in several international institutions. Most notably, The Museum of Modern Art, Pin-Up Magazine, The Graham Foundation, The New York Times, Architect Magazine, DesignMIAMI/ Art Basel, The Swiss Institute, Metropolis Magazine, Curbed, and The National Museum of African American History where he was identified as one of the future designers on the rise.
Eric Firley is of French-German nationality and was born in Düsseldorf, Germany. He studied economics, architecture and city design in Fribourg, Lausanne, Weimar and London, and started his professional career in the real estate sector in Paris. Afterwards he worked for several years in design practices in Paris and London, before dedicating himself full-time to research and writing between 2007 and 2010. In 2011 he became assistant professor at the University of Miami School of Architecture. Firley is the initiator and co-author of Wiley’s Urban Handbook Series that consists of three reference works in the field of housing, high-rise urbanism and masterplanning. He has lectured in institutions around the world, including the Skyscraper Museum and Cooper Union in NYC, the Architectural Association and Bartlett School in London, UC Berkeley, the National University of Singapore, the Parisian Planning Office (APUR), Queensland University of Technology and McGill University in Montreal. Firley’s research has been funded by various public and private sector entities, including Grosvenor, Stanhope, the Arts Council and Design for London. His current research focuses on urban design practice, alternative models of housing production and the impact of immigration on urban form.
Edgar Sarli has been a faculty member at the University of Miami, School of Architecture since 2009. He received a Masters of Architecture in Urban Design from Harvard University in 2003 and his Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Miami in 1999. After collaborating in the office of Rafael Moneo for five years, he founded Loeb Sarli Architects. The firm’s project-based research ranges from large-scale urban interventions to a collection of portable furniture for contemporary nomadic urbanites. The office has won awards in Switzerland and Spain, and its work has been featured in AV, Domus web, and NZZ. It has been exhibited in America and Europe, including the Architecture Biennale in Venice. Mr. Sarli is a Florida Registered Architect, and teaches Building Technology, Design, and Visual Representation.
Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, FAIA, LEED AP, is Malcolm Matheson Distinguished Professor of Architecture and Director of the Master of Urban Design Program. She has a joint appointment in the Department of Public Health Sciences at the Miller School of Medicine. She was dean of the School of Architecture 1995-2013. She teaches courses on urban design and built environment adaptation to climate change. Plater-Zyberk has collaborated with faculty across the University including recently with Engineering colleagues researching net-zero water management in buildings. She is a member of the UM Built Environment Behavior and Health Research Group, working with Miller School faculty on projects researching the well-being of children and elders’ relation to characteristics of the built context in which they live. As a consultant with DPZ Partners, she has worked with healthcare systems in Richmond and Chicago on the design of their campuses and community surroundings. Plater-Zyberk is recognized as a leader of the movement called the New Urbanism, promoting walkable resilient urban design. A co-founder of the Congress for the New Urbanism in 1992, her teaching, research and consulting professional practice has ranged across new community design, community rebuilding, regional plans and zoning codes. A number of innovations in professional practice, such as the traditional neighborhood design zoning code (TND), were initiated with students in School of Architecture design studios and first implemented through community outreach in South Florida. Recent professional projects include the design of the University President’s house and the City of Miami Zoning Code, Miami 21. Plater-Zyberk’s publications include refereed journal articles and book chapters. She is co-author of Suburban Nation: the Rise of Sprawl and the Decline of the American Dream (over 85,000 sold), and The New Civic Art: Elements of Town Planning. Her work, with Andres Duany and DPZ Partners, has received numerous awards and recognitions including honorary degrees, Architectural Record’s first Women in Architecture Award, and the Richard H. Driehaus Prize for Classical Architecture. She has served on numerous review and editorial panels, including the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts.
An architect and an artist, Rocco Ceo teaches courses in design, Design/Build (with Jim Adamson), foundation courses in freehand and mechanical drawing, drawing seminars on color theory, Michelangelo, Historic American Building Survey/HABS and Historic American Landscape Survey/HALS. He has produced drawings of the elements of Florida’s landscapes as well as the documentation of seminal sites in the history of South Florida such as Vizcaya and the Marjory Stoneman Douglas home. His published work includes the award winning books, Redland: A Preservation and Tourism Plan done with Margot Ammidown and Maria Nardi and Historic Landscapes of Florida co-authored with Joanna Lombard. His architecture practice focuses on the unique relationship between architecture and landscape found in the American Tropics. His work has received awards from the Florida Trust for Historic Preservation, Progressive Architecture, and I.D. Magazine and the Miami Chapter of AIA. His interest in paradox found in the study of the natural world informs his architecture, research and painting.
Joel Lamere received his Master of Architecture degree from the Harvard Graduate School of Design. Before joining UM’s School of Achitecture, he was Assistant Professor of Architectural Design and Homer A. Burnell Chair at MIT. Lamere’s research addresses the future of building practice through innovation in emerging means and methods. As computational design processes evolve, and digital fabrication techniques become more commonplace, our built environment promises to transform radically. Lamere explores this changing landscape through Future Objects at the School of Architecture, a laboratory dedicated to experimentation and innovation in the field of construction technology.
In addition, Lamere is investigating the design of coastal structures - a key ingredient in the struggle to overcome the effects of global climate change. The topic has an ugly history, rife with faulty solutions that reflect the incredible complexity of the problem: the vast number of variables and systemic interactions that occur along a coastline. With this complexity in mind, Lamere joined an interdisciplinary faculty team to address the question from a range of perspectives simultaneously. This team, part of the University of Miami Laboratory for Integrative Knowledge (U-LINK), is working to design the next generation of coastal structures in a way that protects communities from rising seas and the other effects of climate change without negatively affecting coastal ecosystems and the vitality of nearby communities.
Frank Martinez is an Associate Professor at the University of Miami, School of Architecture, with a secondary appointment in the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Miller School of Medicine. He holds an undergraduate degree from the University of Miami and a graduate degree from Princeton University. He teaches design, drawing and theory in the core of both undergraduate and graduate programs in the School of Architecture. In the past five years he has lectured and led tours in the Graduate Rome program on Roman Villas and Gardens, with primary interest in Renaissance & Baroque Architecture and Urban Design, as well as the summer traveling course: The Grand Tour. Professor Martinez is a member of the Built Environment and Health Research Group, an interdisciplinary research team led by José Szapocznik, chair of Epidemiology and Public Health at UM’s Miller School of Medicine, and is co-author of numerous articles on the impact of the built environment on health. The team, investigates the impact of the built environment on Hispanic elders’ health (funded by the National Institute on Aging, National Institutes of Health), children’s conduct and Hispanic immigrants’ risk for metabolic syndrome, The first results of this work were published in the September 2006 issue of the American Journal of Community Psychology with subsequent publications in journals in public health and architecture, most recently, the 2009 Journal of Gerontology: Social Sciences. Professor Martinez is also is a founder and design partner in Martinez & Alvarez Architecture, Inc. in which he works collaboratively with his partner and wife, Ana Alvarez. The work has focused primarily on architectural and urban projects that contribute to the art of making cities. Underlying the teaching and research is an exploration of drawing as a method for acquiring and developing architectural knowledge.
Florian Sauter is an Austrian architect and theorist. Together with Charlotte von Moos he is the co-founder of the architectural practice Sauter von Moos based in Basel and Miami. The studio engages in work on all scales, both in theory and practice. Sauter holds a Master and Ph.D. degree from ETH Zurich, where he also taught for many years. He was a Visiting Professor at TU Munich, Cornell AAP and workshop leader at Porto Academy. Sauter is the co-editor of Earth Water Air Fire: The Four Elements and Architecture and the author of Painting the Sky Black: Louis Kahn and the Architectonization of Nature.
Carmen L. Guerrero is a licensed architect, Associate Dean of Strategic Initiatives and Facilities and Associate Professor in Practice at the University of Miami School of Architecture. She received a Bachelor of Architecture degree from the University of Miami (1990) and a Master of Architecture degree from Cornell University (1994). Since 2000 she has been involved as Director for the School’s Rome program and has developed special courses on the architecture and urbanism of 20th century Italy. Her research has contributed to several international exhibitions and publications focusing on Italian Rationalism. Additionally, she has taught travel seminars and studios concentrating on the impact of regionalism on the design of modern & contemporary architecture in Europe and the Caribbean. The work produced by her students has contributed to preservation and revitalization efforts in Italy, Colombia and the Dominican Republic. Her teaching experience also includes interior design studio and elective courses. In 2008 her architecture and interior design firm received the Coral Gables Chamber of Commerce City Beautiful Award followed by recognition in local and national publications. More recently she was awarded a grant from the Ministry of Education in Italy, which promotes academic collaborations with institutions of the Southern Italian hemisphere.
Mark began his career at Security Pacific Realty Advisory Services where he created innovative financial and transaction strategies for troubled assets and opportunistic situations while directing multi-disciplinary teams in land development and building projects nationwide. In addition to lecturing at the University of Miami, he is Senior Vice President of Brookwood Group, manages the firm’s operations in Florida, and brings a broad investment perspective to its development projects and real estate advisory services practice nationwide.
Teófilo Victoria holds a Masters of Architecture and Urban Design Degree from Columbia University, a Bachelors of Fine Arts and a Bachelors of Architecture from The Rhode Island School of Design. He has been visiting professor at Harvard University and Cornell University and has lectured and participated in juries at the University of Maryland, Notre Dame University and the Instituto Universitario di Architettura in Venice. At the University of Miami he was Undergraduate Program Director from 1995 to 1998 and from 1999 to 2009, Graduate Program Director. He has exhibited at the University of Pennsylvania and at the Institute of Classical Architecture in New York. In 1992 he co-edited Between Two Towers, the Drawings of the School of Miami, with Vincent Scully, Catherine Lynn and Jorge Hernandez and was the guest editor of Archivos de Arquitectura Antillana in 2009.
Completing his Masters in Architecture at the University of Toronto in 2014, Chris draws from his education, experience and interests in Design, Computer Science, Digital Fabrication, and Physical Computing to help develop and manage RAD-UM, a research lab dedicated for project-based research on the spatial ramifications of embedded technology and ubiquitous computing. Located at the University of Miami's School of Architecture, RAD’s research is premised on the notion that every building or landscape component can be equipped with computational power. Over the last several years, Chris has overseen the growth of RAD-UM and its projects like Cof-e-Bar, Bio-Display, Zenciti, and Robotic Cloud. His interests lie in bridging the digital and the physical realms within the public arena, particularly in ways that can create new and exciting social interactions.
