Architects Bergendy Cooke, Grégoire Du Pasquier, Ruth Baleiko and Mathew Albores have been announced as Archello Awards 2024 jurors, strengthening an impressive international panel of esteemed designers. Read on to learn more about their careers and work:
In 2008, after 10 years living and working in Europe and North America, Bergendy Cooke set up a practice in her native New Zealand. She brought with her experience garnered from renowned practices such as Zaha Hadid Architects and Adjaye Associates in London and Peter Marino Architects in New York.
Currently based in Barcelona, with a team in New Zealand, the practice continues to work on projects around the world. Cooke has an inherent passion for art and projects perceived not just as buildings but also as inhabited sculptures. The practice works to create refreshing, innovative and refined solutions through a rigorous process incorporating site, client brief and an investigation of materials that are chosen for their durability and timelessness.
Cooke creates works that are a unique reply to their location and culture, inspired by history and local vernacular, forming a contemporary architectural response. Essential to each project is an investigation of feasibility, economy, sustainability and most importantly, strong client collaboration. Cooke's practice has experience in many parts of the world and in many sectors - from small- to large-scale spaces for living, hotels, exhibition, multi-storey, retail, renovation and interior design, to pieces of furniture and art.
Grégoire Du Pasquier is an architect and graduate of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne, Switzerland. He is a co-founder and Partner at G8A Architecture & Urban Planning. Prior to starting his own practice, Grégoire gained valuable international design and management experience in New York and Paris, working for companies such as Guedot & Chaslin architects.
Currently in charge of operations at the G8A Ho Chi Minh City and Geneva offices, Grégoire also co-manages the offices in Hanoi and Singapore. His main responsibilities include design direction, conceptual design and project management. Grégoire is at the head of all development projects across the G8A offices and is the initial contact for potential projects and collaborations. G8A's project for the Jakob Factory Ho Chi Minh was recently profiled by Archello as part of its Detail news series.
Ruth Baleiko, FAIA, is a Partner at Seattle-based The Miller Hull Partnership. She believes architecture, as a profession, is all too often perceived as an intellectual, academic and therefore exclusive discipline. This notion is one that she is eager to disprove. “I think the practice could do more to demonstrate the approachability in what we do.” Determined to demystify the impact architects bring to spaces, Baleiko believes that accessibility is key for the industry to flourish; people need to see that good design is for everyone, everywhere, and an architect’s job is to improve, build community, make places.
Always answering a question with a question, Baleiko is ever-curious, pushing colleagues and clients alike to get to the essence, the conceptual center that contains the relatable human root. Bringing building design to its elemental core, Baleiko believes this might be the way to expose the universality of the practice. After all, humans have an innate relationship with the surrounding space, and are conditioned to know what feels right or wrong without necessarily being able to pinpoint the reason. Her approach aims to speak to this instinctive awareness within people, inspiring delight within every person who encounters her work. The Miller Hull Partnership has completed a wide range of projects such as the Kendeda Building for Innovative Sustainable Design which was a recent focus of Archello's Detail article news series.
Mathew Albores, AIA, is a Principal at Seattle-based The Miller Hull Partnership. Albores has always been deeply shaped by his environment. With a father who worked at the U.S. State Department, his family routinely moved from country to country while he was growing up, exposing him to a variety of new places. His bedroom in each of these countries became a creative outlet. “I spent a lot of time investing in my how my room looked; where my bed would be and how all the furniture was arranged.” Figuring out how to create familiarity in these ever-changing spaces built the early foundation for Albores' practice.
Since then, Albores' focus has expanded to include large-scale residential projects, buildings of diplomacy, and initiatives that advocate for black, indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC). His involvement in Miller Hull’s internal operations groups – Culture Ops and Equity Lab – helps spread awareness throughout the firm and beyond on equity in design, representation, and leadership, values that Albores believes will soon become an industry-wide standard.
