Footprints are individual, paths are social. -T. Ingold
I am concerned with the 'revolutionary' imagination.
Yazmín M. Crespo Claudio, BED (UPRRP), BArch, MArch (Cornell), MDes in History and Theory (Harvard), is a Puerto Rican architect, researcher, educator, and co-founder/director of taller Creando Sin Encargos (tCSE). She will receive her Ph.D. with a secondary field in Film and Media Studies and a certificate in Latin American Studies in May 2024. Crespo-Claudio is an Architectural History and Theory Lecturer at Harvard University Graduate School of Design. Her scholarship addresses the relationship between architecture, education, media, and territory, focusing on pedagogical experiments of architecture in Latin America and the Caribbean. She has taught and practiced architecture for over twenty years in/from the United States, Spain, and Puerto Rico. Her work has been widely published and exhibited at different venues.
Before coming to Harvard, Crespo-Claudio was the Chair of the Department of Architecture, Landscape Architecture, and Interior Design, Coordinator of the Master in Architecture Design-Build, and Assistant Professor at the International School of Design and Architecture at the Universidad Ana G. Méndez in Gurabo, Puerto Rico. She has also taught at Harvard GSD; New York Institute of Technology; Universidad Politécnica de Puerto Rico; Elisava Escola Universitària de Disseny i Enginyeria de Barcelona; Universidad de Puerto Rico; Universidad Interamericana de Puerto Rico where she was a Professor and Coordinator of the Bachelor of Arts in Design; and Cornell University’s College of Architecture, Art, and Planning.
Her research has been informed by a decade-long involvement in design activism and co-design/build projects with architecture students, which led her to co-found taller Creando Sin Encargos [tCSE], a Cambridge/San Juan-based collective working towards socio-spatial design for urban justice. tCSE methodology is horizontal and interested in the social aspects of architecture and design from an intersectional, decolonial, and critical perspective. tCSE develops co-design/build workshops titled Arquitecturas Colectivas in communities of Puerto Rico. Last year, tCSE was selected for the 13th International Architecture Biennale of São Paulo (2022), the only Caribbean practice exhibited.
Her writings have been published in, among others, De Arquitectura, Bitácora Urbano Territorial, Arquine, Polimorfo, ACSA and UIA proceedings, in the books Aprender Arquitectura by Arquine, Repository: 49 Methods and Assignments for Writing Urban Places by COST Action CA181126, and Placemaking with Children and Youth by Louise Chawla et al (co-authored).
She has presented her work at several venues including the CAA Annual Conference, LASA Conference, Docomomo International Conference, CEISAL International Conference, Jornadas de Investigación Género, Arquitectura, Diseño y Urbanismo FADU UBA, World Congress of Architects UIA, Participatory Design Conference, ACSA International Conference, among others.
Her work has been exhibited at the 13thInternational Architecture Biennale São Paulo (tCSE), Participatory Design Conference Newcastle upon Tyne (tCSE), Storefront for Art and Architecture NYC (tCSE), Kirkland Gallery Cambridge, AIA Puerto Rico, Museu Marítim de Barcelona, and the curation of several art, architecture, and design exhibits.
Crespo-Claudio’s work has been recognized with various awards including the Edita Technical Chamber of Greece at the XIX Congress UIA, and as an Associate Designer at Perkins Eastman the World Architecture Award 2009, and the AIA NY Merit Award for the TKTS Booth in New York.
She is the recipient of the American Association of University Women (AAUW) Dissertation Fellowship 2023-24. In 2022, She was awarded the Harvard Frederick Sheldon Fellowship, the Jorge Paulo Lemann Fellowship, and the Racial, GSD Equity, and Anti-Racism Fund for Archive IN/IN: International Intersectional Feminism in 2023. Her research has been supported by the Harvard Kenneth C. Griffin Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies, and Harvard GSD.
Yazmín is graduating in May 2024, and applying for academic positions.
https://scholar.harvard.edu/yazmincrespo
_________
COURSES
STUDIOS + LECTURES + SEMINARS
She has taught and practiced architecture and design for over twenty years in/from the United States, Spain, and Puerto Rico. She teaches graduate and undergraduate studios, lectures, and seminars.
COMMUNITY
PARTNERSHIP + FELLOWSHIPS
She works with non-academic partners, community organizers, and other actors to support community-based projects.
WORKSHOPS
She facilitates participatory design workshops and modules organized around various topics.
LECTURES
She lectures about various topics relevant to Architecture, Design, Urban Studies, Pedagogy, Latin American, Caribbean, and Puerto Rican Studies, Visual and Cultural Studies, Gender, History, and Theory, among others.
PRESS
PUBLICATIONS + EXHIBITIONS
She writes, publishes, curates, and exhibits. For detailed information, please download my CV or contact me via email: y_crespo@g.harvard.edu