American architectural firm incorporated in 1977 by Bernardo Fort-Brescia (b Lima, Peru, 19 Nov 1950), Laurinda Hope Spear (b Rochester, MN, 23 Aug 1950), Hervin Romney (b Havana, Cuba, 9 Feb 1941), Andres Duany (b New York, 7 Sept 1949) and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk (b Bryn Mawr, PA, 10 Dec 1950). The latter two members of the firm left in 1980 to start their own practice. The firm's early sketches displayed an interest in the surrealistic place-making of Giorgio de Chirico, which Arquitectonica transformed to exercises in geometric abstraction at the layered and orderly Spear house (1977-8), Miami, FL. In its first decade of practice Arquitectonica transformed speculative housing developments, office buildings and shopping centres

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