Soledad Patiño

Soledad Patiño is an Argentinian architect and urbanist, founding partner of Region Austral, a research and design practice based in Cordoba, Argentina. She works as Consultant at the Housing and Urban Development Division of the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB). At IADB she coordinates and supports several urban design initiatives and programs focused on slum upgrading, housing and urban integration of precarious settlements, migration and ecological design in vulnerable contexts, as well as metropolitan governance in Latin America.

Soledad is a licensed architect and she was appointed professor in the School of Architecture and Urbanism at the National University of Cordoba (UNC). Her work focus on exploring socio-ecological approaches to urban planning and design, addressing issues of inequity, social justice, and sustainable infrastructure, with a special interest in building resilience in vulnerable contexts in cities. She holds a Bachelor in Architecture from the UNC School of Architecture and Urbanism (2016), and a Master of Architecture in Urban Design with Distinction from the Harvard Graduate School of Design (2020), where she received the Award of Academic Excellence in Urban Design.

Her work has been featured in recognized exhibitions and events about architecture and urbanism, such as the Chicago Architecture Biennial (2019), the International Biennial of Architecture of Argentina (2018), and HABITAT III, the United Nations Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development (2016) in Quito. She was also awarded in numerous national and international competitions and fellowships, including a Fulbright Scholarship by the Argentine Ministry of Education, a Penny White Research Fellowship at Harvard, and more recently her work was recipient of the First Prize in the Holcim Foundation´s Next Generation Awards (2021).

Soledad´s writings include published essays and articles, as well as books and publications on issues to do with contemporary urbanization. She is co-author of “Fracking Landscapes: Mapping socio-environmental conflicts in Vaca Muerta, Argentina” (2019), a book on extractivism and its impacts on urbanization. In collaboration with Rahul Mehrotra, she edited “Extreme Urbanism 6 – Sanitation as Infrastructure” (2021), on how sanitation infrastructure could be potentially imagined and designed in marginalized communities in Mumbai. She also contributed with the IADB in “Ecological Design: Strategies for the Vulnerable City. Adapting Precarious Areas in Latin America and the Caribbean to Climate Change” (2021), and in the Inmigrando series which seeks to understand migration flux, its impact, and potentials on destination cities. Other publications are underway, including her latest co-authored book: “Ecological Design: Strategies for the Vulnerable City. Case studies in Latin America and the Caribbean”.

Companies

• Professor - Design Critic in Urban Planning and Design Harvard University (2022)
• Consultant in Housing and Urban Development Division - Inter-American Development Bank Banco Interamericano de Desarrollo (2020)
• Professor Universidad Nacional de Córdoba (2021 — 2021)
• Research Associate Harvard University Graduate School of Design (2019 — 2021)
• Fulbright Fellow Fulbright Association (2018 — 2020)
• Master of Architecture in Urban Design Harvard University (2018 — 2020)
• Teaching Assistant Professor Universidad Nacional de Córdoba (2014 — 2018)
• Architect Patiño - Figueroa arquitectos (2014 — 2018)
• Architect PASTO + Carballo-Errasti arquitectos (2014 — 2017)

Education

• Master of Architecture in Urban Design Harvard University Graduate School of Design (2018 — 2020)
• Arquitecta Universidad Nacional de Córdoba (2011 — 2016)