League Prize winner
Ilse Cárdenas, Regina de Hoyos, Diego Escamilla, and Juan Luis Rivera of Palma
Palma | Litibú, Nayarit, Mexico, 2020. Credit: Luis Young
The League Prize is an annual competition that has been organized by The Architectural League since 1981. Open to designers ten years or less out of school, it draws entrants from around North America.
Ilse Cárdenas, Regina de Hoyos, Diego Escamilla, and Juan Luis Rivera of Palma won a 2021 award.
Based in Mexico City and Sayulita, Palma was founded in 2016 by Ilse Cárdenas, Regina de Hoyos, Diego Escamilla, and Juan Luis Rivera. Navigating between typologies in both urban and rural contexts, the practice aims to improve communities through inventive work.
Recent projects include:
- Litibú, a 538-square-foot bungalow in Nayarit, a state on Mexico’s Pacific coast, made of two volumes connected by a central patio with a roof made of dried palm leaves.
- Ocuilán, a 484-square-foot house for a family displaced by the 2017 earthquake in Mexico.
- Aros, a temporary installation transforming a fountain into a playground for children in a disadvantaged neighborhood in Mexico City. The project was the winner of the 2018 Concurso Juguetes Urbanos.
Cárdenas, de Hoyos, Escamilla, and Rivera hold BArch degrees from the Autonomous National University of Mexico (UNAM).
Palma’s work has been published in Arquine’s Arquitecturas Mexicanas: Lo mejor del siglo XXI (2015–2016, 2017–2018, and forthcoming 2019–2020) and exhibited at Harvard Graduate School of Design, Museo de la ciudad de Mexico, and Archivo Diseño y Arquitectura.
Learn more:
-
- “Circular opening illuminates patio for yoga in coastal Mexican holiday house” by Eleanor Gibson, DeZeen, 2020
- “A minimalist Mexican retreat offers escape through simplicity” by Ellie Stathaki, Wallpaper*, 2020
- “Escandón Terrace / PALMA” curated by Danae Santibañez, ArchDaily, 2018
