For Rodríguez + De Mitri, a budding Cuernavaca architecture practice, design is 'conversation’

Alessandra de Mitri started out studying architecture at the UK’s Oxford Brookes University, but felt disheartened by the programme. She sought a more experiential approach, one that treated space not merely as structure but as a medium for lived experience. This led her to Switzerland’s Mendrisio Academy, where the curriculum focused on phenomenology, emotional resonance and sensory perception. Here she met Roberto Rodríguez, an architect from Mexico City who had arrived at Mendrisio driven by a curiosity that mirrored her own.

Meet Rodríguez + De Mitri, the young architecture studio from Cuernavaca

After internships with the likes of Francis Keré and Flores & Prats, the pair graduated in the midst of a global pandemic. Rodríguez returned to Mexico City, where he began working at TAX, under celebrated architect Alberto Kalach. Soon after, de Mitri followed, taking jobs at the studios of Mauricio Rocha and Ignacio Urquiza.

As it happens, their debut commission came through a personal connection: a family friend recommended them for a plant nursery that would aid the reforestation efforts of the Sian Ka’an biosphere reserve in Quintana Roo, which had been severely damaged by fires in 2019.

Modest in scale but ambitious in intention, the reforestation nursery was a prefabricated structure of galvanised steel, draped in agricultural mesh and raised above ground to leave minimal impact on the fragile landscape and reduce the risk of plant disease. It was the first project that Rodríguez and de Mitri formally designed together, but years of academic collaboration had already attuned them to a smooth cycle of mutual feedback. ‘The Mendrisio culture encourages open reviews and constant discussion,’ says Rodríguez. ‘It’s still part of our process – design as conversation,’ adds de Mitri.

Their second project, a three-unit housing development on a 200 sq m plot, marked a turning point. ‘It was more complex than the nursery,’ Rodríguez recalls. ‘All exposed brick and concrete, full-scale supervision.’

When they officially founded Rodríguez + de Mitri, it was with the aim of approaching architecture on their own terms. ‘We try to rethink structural systems and material origins, to propose lighter, less conventional solutions,’ says Rodríguez. Echoes de Mitri, ‘It’s about designing in negative, thinking about what can be removed, using the minimum materials needed.’

This approach, she says, ‘has an ethical as well as an aesthetic dimension.’ Their budding practice insists that architecture be measured, intentional and attentive – a space where every material, void and gesture serves a purpose, allowing both the environment and its inhabitants to breathe.

rodriguezdemitri.com