In this episode, in conversation with Tiago Mota Saraiva, we discuss the work of ateliermob and Working with the 99% and together explore the transforming role of an architecture studio amidst economic and democratic crises

Through their work they continuously and explicitly push the boundaries of architecture, rejecting any of the boxes the discipline is trying to fit them in. Moving beyond their acclaimed community kitchen in Teras da Costa, they reject the aestheticization of informality and call for the architect’s entanglement in the political and legal spheres. These new modes of engagement and action, supporting communities in their spatial claims, chart a new course for architecture in times when the future appears hopeless.

Tiago Mota Saraiva is an architect and urbanist based in Lisbon, Portugal. He holds a degree in Architecture (University of Lisbon, Portugal) and has completed a specialisation course in Architecture, Territory and Memory (University of Coimbra, Portugal). Tiago has collaborated with esteemed studios across Europe and has served as an invited assistant professor in a number of universities. Since 2019, he is an Invited Professor at the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Lisbon. Tiago currently is a managing partner of ateliermob, where he has been active since its establishment in 2005, director of the cooperative “Working with the 99%”, and a member of the cooperative of local initiatives Sou Largo.