Emerging in the Mexican city of Guadalajara around 1927 and strongly active until 1936, the Escuela Tapatía de Arquitectura was a movement that sought to forge a distinctly regional vein of modernism, favouring local materials and artisanal craft in response to the era’s preoccupation with industrial novelty and stylistic experimentation.
La Cruz de Huanacaxtle Apartments
Meet Guadalajara architects Barbapiña
Nearly a century later, local architects Laura Barba and Luis Aurelio Piña cite that vision as a guiding principle of their practice. However, their devotion manifests in a contemporary interpretation of the ethos, adapted across diverse sites and programmes.
La Paz Hotel
Barba and Piña founded their studio in 2022, following a decade of collaboration that began at university and continued through their time as colleagues in various local firms. ‘We remain committed to the philosophy that we shared when we first began designing together, which circles around the intention of generating a sense of belonging,’ says Barba.
San Pancho Hotel
Their office, in Guadalajara’s historic Americana district, stands as tangible proof of that pursuit – a warm space with gauzy curtains, disparate curios and robust wooden furnishings, evoking the feeling of permanence and familiarity that underpins Barbapiña’s work. Each project begins with small-scale investigations that contemplate the narratives of a place, studying the particular rhythms of daily life, the collective memories embedded in the region, and the material qualities of the site’s context, whether it be a natural or built environment.
Altar Mueble Arquitectónico Exhibit
‘There are vast differences in the way architecture is conceived, from north to south and in between,’ says Piña, reflecting on the experiences of designing a family home in Baja California, a residential complex in Quintana Roo, and mixed-use projects in Guadalajara.
San Pancho Hotel rooftop
While some architects build a body of work that can be read as the continuous refinement of a single formal idea, Barbapiña allows the site to set the tone, ‘not so much as a quest for innovation,’ Piña says, ‘but from a desire to create spaces that appear born of their specific surroundings.’
La Cruz de Huanacaxtle Apartments Entryway
It is increasingly rare for an architect to state that their work is concerned with cultivating beauty and preserving tradition, but Barbapiña do not view these aims as mutually exclusive. ‘We live in a world where rapid urbanisation and globalisation have led to a generalised crisis of identity,’ says Barba. ‘So beauty, memory and belonging have become matters of great urgency.’ By focusing on the cadence of history and the textures of local life, and honouring both culture and environment, Barbapiña creates architecture that is inherently sustainable and designed to last.
This article is part of a series on Mexican architects that appears in the January 2026 Next Generation issue of Wallpaper*, available in print on newsstands, on the Wallpaper* app on Apple iOS, and to subscribers of Apple News + from 4 December 2025. Subscribe to Wallpaper* today
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