SPRB is an architecture and landscape design studio based in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico. Since its founding by Laura Sánchez Penichet and Carlos Rodríguez Bernal in 2007, they have developed the ability to adapt to each situation and respond with a specific solution for each project, in a process guided by intuition, reflection, and the senses. Rather than intellectualizing architecture, they believe it should be experienced. It should be felt, given that, according to their mission statement, spaces don't need explanations; they need emotions.
Laura Sánchez Penichet is an architect from ITESO (2001) and holds a master's degree in Sustainable Architecture and Environmental Control Techniques (2004) and in Digitalization of Architectural Projects (2005) from UPC Barcelona. She collaborated with the DOSBASSO studio in Barcelona (2004–2005), was head of construction at Puerta de Hierro (2005–2007), and has been a professor of project management at the ITESO School of Architecture since 2006.
Carlos Rodríguez Bernal holds a degree in architecture from the UAG (1994) and a Master's degree in Landscape Architecture from the UPC (Barcelona) (1999). Founder and editor of PISO magazine, he was director of the Architecture Department at the Tecnológico de Monterrey Campus in Guadalajara (2001–2005). He was a FONCA fellow (1997–1999), a member of the CONACULTA Advisory Committee (2004–2005), and has been a professor of project management at ITESO since 2006. He has been a full member of the National Academy of Architecture since 2015.
Both founded SPRB with the conviction of exploring, through design, the relationships between architecture, landscape, and context. Their trajectories converge in a practice that emphasizes sensitivity, spatial experience, and a sense of place.
They prioritize the idea of place, and their work cultivates natural and anthropized landscapes. They conceive of architecture as something deeply rooted in the soil, in the specificity of the site where a community lives, with its uses and customs, and its climate. History matters to them in order to act with common sense. But they are also attracted to the blank page; to intervene with conviction to take risks in the face of current problems.
They are interested in function; it is in the anomalies of the program that a building's best moments occur. They like to mold, shape, excavate, and empty form. Form also seems important to them.
They are attracted to skin, to surfaces, especially pavements, to the way they weave spaces, linking volumes and defining places. They seek honesty in materiality. They find interest in detail as a logical consequence of a sequence of scales, not as an end in itself.
They are not interested in preconceptions. Even less so in dogmas. They believe that each project must construct its own narrative. Nor are they interested in self-indulgence. In their work, there is no such thing as a defined style; rather, it is a unique way of doing things. Their portfolio reflects this.
They feel comfortable on very diverse scales. Regardless of the size or type of project, they strive to develop its public character and the vitality it can instill in its surroundings.
