Marcello Rodriguez Pons

Early years

Marcello Rodriguez Pons is an architect born in the city of Cordoba, Argentina. Part of his professional work during the first years was of a conceptual nature, and gradually, as the years passed, his ideas materialised into concrete projects. His work has been recognized on several occasions with International Architecture Awards. Son of a German mother and an Argentinian father, he did his elementary schooling at Academia Arguello, in his home town. He developed his first experiences in design at architectural firms while he studied architecture at the National University of Cordoba In 1994, he formed a small architectural firm, and in 2000 he completed his Masters Degree in Architectural and Urban Design at the same university in Argentina. He moved to Malaga, Spain, where he worked at HCP Architecture & Engineering, from 2002 and until 2011. In 2012 he opened his own architecture office Rodriguez Pons & Partners. His activity as an architect is based on the development of Master Plans for communities all over the world, and the design of elegant and efficient buildings in a modern style, taking special care on the light and how it affects them and the use of cutting-edge materials, primarily on the facades of his buildings.

Works and Projects

Among his main architectural current works he has designed the Millennium Casino & Resort, Fier, Albania, a 500 hectars master plan which includes two of the highest multi-use towers in Europe which rise up to +400m. These towers have an elliptical faceted exoskeleton design for the buildings layout providing both gravity and lateral resistance for the building. The structural exoskeleton diagrid system creates an open, column-free environment. With spans between diagrid nodes of over than fifteen meters, views to the three golf courses and the 500 yachts marina from the interior are expansive. In order to maintain purely axial loads in the elliptical form, diagrid members are constructed from straight, rather than curving segments which make them more cost effective among other sustainable design solutions.

Previously as project director at HCP Architecture and Engineering he designed the People Square Towers in the city of Hefei, China, a multifunctional complex that features a surrounding structure in the form of “scales” that fulfil the double function of supporting the structure and acting as a filter for the sunlight, making it a project with one of the highest levels of sustainability. On the island of Bahrain in the Persian Gulf, Amwaj Park District is a project with a “skin” featuring horizontal aluminium strips that provide dynamism and unity to the whole complex, which is located on an artificial manmade island. Among his Master Plan projects, Alcaidesa Universidad del Golf in Spain and Dannat Resort in Khobar, Saudi Arabia stand out on account of their gentle shapes that merge firmly and harmoniously into their respective environments.

Recently, as CEO and lead architect at Rodriguez Pons & Partners he designed the Valle Patagonia Polo Club + Boutique Hotel which is the main architecture development inside a bigger master plan called Valle Patagonia of 264 hectares in the Chilean Patagonia, also designed by Rodriguez Pons & Partners, surrounded by mountains, forests, lakes and rivers, with medium to high-end residential units and the most complete services and infrastructure including social and sports activities. The overall image of the hotel project is a low rise white curved building, contrasting with the dark wooden roof, openings and detailing, merged into the natural beauty of the virgin forest site with the Osorno Volcano on the background.

The Olympic Sports Initiation Center designed in 2015 is a low rise development located inside a bigger master plan at the called Cidade Esportiva da Baixada Fluminense in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. This 30 hectar master plan, also designed by Rodriguez Pons & Partners, includes, this sports center, 3000 residential units, school, retal, native foests, lagoons and the Brazilian Volunteer Firefighters Brigade. The sports buildings have a clean and tensioned silhouette with which the white horizontal lines of the grades and the curve of the grades-roof contrast with the vertical sun protection wooden blinds of the Indoor Arena, and with the faceted white concrete block elevations of the Aquatics Stadium. It is a low rise construction “combo” which formally interacts among them with the use of the same materials in all of the buildings, although each one has its own character and strength, and in the overall, the structures give the highway crossroad neighborhood a new sportive and modern personality. Between them, a multipurpose open air plaza join the buildings with the parking areas and the rest of the sports fields “connected” by large overhangs, canopies, fountains and ramps.

Publications

Sports Prizes and Awards

In addition to his professional activity as an architect, Marcello Rodriguez Pons has represented Argentina eight times in Sailing World Championships in different classes of windsurfing and sailing boats; he was among the World Top 10 on four occasions. He won the Gold Medal in the 1990 Windsurf World Championship Division II Lightweight, Buenos Aires, Argentina