Duarte Santo

Duarte Santo is an Architect, Landscape and Urban Designer, Educator and Researcher operating across art, architecture, landscape, and tourism. His scholarship and work, framed by an intersectional approach to Landscapes, focus on sensory ecologies and design, islands and material(ities) flows.

A fully qualified Architect, having studied in Porto and London, Duarte holds a Post Graduate degree in Planning and Design Urban Environments and a Masters degree in Landscape Architecture, from ETSAB/Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Barcelona.  He is an experienced practitioner, with 20 years of experience in projects across all scales and stages of design and implementation/construction, both in the private and public sectors. He co-founded and was managing partner of jigsaw (2002-2008), a design practice established in Porto, and has worked professionally as both architect, landscape, and Urban designer at award-winning practices like OMA/Rem Koolhaas, in Rotterdam or Allies and Morrison in London and high profile projects such as Casa da Música in Porto, the Lisbon Aquarium extension, the Portuguese consulate of Portugal in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, the former Commonwealth Institute/Design Museum, London and urban (master)plans in London and the Middle East.

Engaged with artists and practices to create and/or curate interdisciplinary projects, he conceived and co-coordinated the curatorial project "A2V: gazes, visions, and expressions of the contemporary landscape of Madeira" with artist residences and exhibition; the international workshop "Landscape & Tourism in Zagreb" in Croatia, or TRACE, a research/creation and exhibition project, for the London Festival of Architecture. His latest project, “on the im/permanence of the (is)land” is a sensorial object (visual essay/video), displayed in the Landscape, resilience, and Art section of the Italian Pavilion at the 2021 Venice Architecture Biennale.

Duarte has taught design studios and seminars in architecture, urban design, tourism and Landscape architecture at universities in Europe before joining the Department of Landscape Architecture. . At Cornell University, he teaches seminars on Material Flows and Diversity, Equity and inclusion in Landscapes and leads the [Eco]Sensorial Studio, exploring the senses, sensory assemblages and ecologies as a framework for inquiry and speculation on global issues and design practice in more-than-human environments.

Selected Publications

• In preparation. Perez-Ramos, Pablo, Duarte Santo and Stefania Staniscia “Seven Mediterranean Islands: Soil Formations and Anthropic Pressures”, MedWays.2022
• Dean, Corinna, Victoria Watson, and Duarte Santo. "Trace: Translating Bankside Air Raid Shelter through Material and Spatial Tracings." Architecture and Culture 7.1 (2019): 85-93.
• Salgueiro, Ana  and Duarte Santo “OUVERTURE_PRE.LÚ.DI.O (Trans)Locadidade e Culturas Urbanas” in TRANSLOCAL, 1. (2018): 6-13.