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[title]Jorgelina Tortorici designs homes that can be felt. With light, soul, and an aesthetic that blends simplicity with sophistication, she has made her signature instantly recognizable. Leading her firm, Jorgelina Tortorici & Associates — which she shares with architect Nicolás Lanza — she creates spaces that move people, without losing sight of either technology or craftsmanship. In this conversation, we talk about inspiration, creative processes, architecture with identity, motherhood, models, barbecues, and that magical moment when an idea moves from paper to real life.
In a world where everything changes so fast — how we live, work, and inhabit spaces — how do you think architecture is adapting (or should adapt)?
I believe architecture is adapting faster and faster to what is happening.
Today, technology accompanies us daily. We document in BIM, we incorporate AI into most of the programs used for drawing, there’s 3D printing, digitalized construction, even smart, domotized houses.
After the pandemic, flexibility and adaptability were demanded, and the way we work and live in houses changed forever. Architecture is asked to reduce its carbon footprint and impact, and it is achieving that too. I see how architecture adapts at the speed the world demands.
After the pandemic, flexibility and adaptability were demanded, and the way we work and live in houses changed forever
What concerns or interests you as an architect right now?
I worry that in this speed I mentioned, architecture becomes depersonalized. That in this path of technology, the cultural context, the use of local materials, local craftsmanship are lost, resulting in architecture disconnected from the people who live in those spaces. I think we must not lose the local, the authentic. What happens outside inspires us, yes, but the essence of each project is born from looking inward, from a gaze toward what is our own.
You’re young, a woman, you lead your own studio, and your houses have become a trademark. How do you experience that position? Did you imagine you would get there so quickly?
Surely it wasn’t quick or easy. What you see of our work is just the tip of the iceberg. Behind it are years of work, mistakes, deep searching, and daring to take risks and always challenge the project. I have always had a very intimate desire to do things well. I’m interested in architecture that moves people, that is sensitive, detailed, almost poetic. Being a woman and leading a studio is about opening paths for me. I enjoy what I do, I live it with passion. I’m a serial optimist. I split myself between the architect who could spend hours drawing, imagining, creating… and the mother of three kids, who also really enjoys that part of life. What is valued today about my work is the result of putting my heart into every project. Of trying to make it unique, to find a different way every time. Allowing myself to revise, rethink, and look again from scratch… always.
I enjoy what I do, I live it with passion. I’m a serial optimist
Your works have something you can feel: lots of light, noble materials, simple but super elegant lines. What do you look for when designing a house? Is there something that can never be missing?
For me, making a house is an invitation to live in a unique way. I always think about how I can surprise, how I can move, what can happen inside, and it always starts from within — from the interior space — so that living in and walking through a house makes me feel good. That it allows me to live free and happy in a home, gives me peace, lets me gather with friends, offers me the sun while I have breakfast. These everyday things, those daily routines, are what we try to put poetry into. To make them unique. I see opportunities everywhere. In an entrance, I see the chance to celebrate it, to create a journey; in a staircase, a powder room... all spaces are like a blank page that must be their best version!
For me, making a house is an invitation to live in a unique way
Some start with an idea, others with an image, or even a conversation with the client. What is your creative process? Where do you like to start?
My creative process always starts with a freehand drawing. Ideas appear in my mind as images, fragments of a journey, moments. Then on paper, I leave marks without much definition but with intention. I love that moment! Also, there is the first talk with clients, which is fundamental. We don’t talk much about the image of the house, or the formal aspects, but about how they want to live: what moments they enjoy, how they are with family and friends. Incorporating and understanding that intimacy is what personalizes the work. From there, scenes, routes, and spatial situations emerge. All that first translates into sketches, then moves to 3D modeling to explore materials and forms. For me, each house is an invitation to live differently and uniquely for each person who commissions us.
On your social media, you show that you still draw by hand and make models, but you also use technology. How do you live with that? What place does craftsmanship have in your work today?
I deeply value craftsmanship. I support technology and all the advances that allow us to work better, but I think we should not lose the craft in architecture. In the kind of work we do at the studio, we worry about how trades are being lost. Fewer and fewer people know materials in depth and can work on them in detail. And we need them more and more. Technology comes to solve, to build, to make our process more efficient. But at the moment of ideas, everything starts from the most essential: paper, pencil, and mind. Architecture, for me, starts by hand.
I support technology and all the advances that allow us to work better, but I think we should not lose the craft in architecture
BUENOS AIRES PING-PONG
A neighborhood that inspires you for its creative energy?
I still like Palermo... Although, I have mixed feelings — it lost a bit of its neighborhood identity, but that’s the price you pay for growing.
A Buenos Aires work of architecture you never get tired of looking at?
The Banco de Londres by Clorindo Testa.
Do you have your little place to disconnect or brainstorm ideas?
I’d say it’s not a place but a moment, a pause. Always with music, with paper and pencils. It can be at my studio table, in a field, or in my motorhome.
Where do you go when you want to walk and slow down?
I go back to Adrogué. I’ve lived there since I was a kid and I love going back.
A cultural plan you’d recommend to a tourist?
See Buenos Aires from a rooftop.
A truly porteño (Buenos Aires) food you love?
Asado (Argentinian barbecue).
A place that makes you proud as an architect — a corner of the city that makes you think:“This was well done”?
The National Library. I love the greenery it leaves underneath. The greenhouse is also a place for a tourist who appreciates our architecture.