NUA arquitectures is a young studio located in Tarragona founded in 2013 by Maria Rius, Arnau Tiñena and Ferran Tiñena, architects who graduated with honours from the Barcelona School of Architecture.
The studio’s work explores the fields of architecture and design at different scales through strategies that are sensitive to the memory of places and the environment, seeking to respond to the contemporary social and cultural challenges of cities and territories through interventions whose main objective is to improve people’s lives.
NUA arquitectures has diversified its activity in different fields and typologies, focusing its projects from the urban perspective to the design of detail simultaneously. The work and work carried out in recent years have recognised it as one of the emerging young studios in Spain and Europe, within the framework of the last three editions of the Arquia/próxima programme (2014, 2016 and 2018), and being selected this year 2023 as one of the 40 most promising studios under 40 on the continent according to the European Centre for Architecture, Art, Design and Urban Studies, and the Chicago Athenaeum Museum (Europe 40 under 40).
In 2016 it was one of the 7 studios selected to represent Catalonia at the Venice International Architecture Biennale, and recently the studio’s projects have been recognised at the European Prize for Contemporary Architecture – Mies van der Rohe Awards (2019), at the FAD Awards (2018), in the Spanish Biennial of Architecture and Urbanism (2018, 2021, 2023), in the ASCER Awards (2017, 2023) and in the Alejandro de la Sota Biennial (2013, 2015, 2017, 2017, 2019, 2021, 2023), including the extraordinary prize for the last 20 years of its edition in the rehabilitation category (1997-2017), among others.
NUA’s work has been published in different national and international media, and has been included in AV’s “Spain 2019” yearbook. Recently the Argentinean publishing house Bisman has published a monograph on his work.
The studio has been invited to give lectures at various universities and institutions in Spain, Italy, Slovenia and the United States, such as the Design Museum and the Santa Monica Arts Centre in Barcelona, the COAMadrid, the Schools of Architecture of Barcelona, Madrid Donosti, Valencia, Milan and Cagliari, the Archmarathon International Congress in Milan, the International Congress of the Piranesi Awards in Slovenia, the Scaliurbani Congress in Livorno, and the College of Architecture of Texas A&M University and the University of Virginia, among others. The Scaliurbani Congress in Livorno, or the College of Architecture of Texas A&M University and the University of Virginia, among others.
NUA arquitectures has been part of the teaching team of the School of Art and Design of Reus (EADR), of the University School of Design and Engineering of Barcelona (ELISAVA) and, currently, is part of the teaching team of Projects and Urbanism of the School of Architecture of Reus (EAR-URV). He has also participated as an external jury member in several critical sessions at the Barcelona School of Architecture (ETSAB-UPC), at the School of Architecture of the International University of Catalonia (UIC), at the La Salle School of Architecture (URL), and at the College of Architecture of Texas A&M University.