ELIA was founded in 2022 by Borja Ferrater, Alberto Peñín, Ignasi Fontcuberta, Xavier Martí, and Guillem Vilalata, based on a shared understanding that the world for which architecture is designed is inherently complex. Rather than resisting this condition, the studio chooses to engage with it. ELIA believes that contemporary architecture is no longer about imposing form, but about carefully interpreting situations, understanding the forces at play, identifying hidden relationships, and translating them into spatial solutions that are both precise and meaningful. Each project is approached as an opportunity to interpret reality rather than simplify it.

ELIA’s approach is rooted in process. The studio begins by observing, questioning, and uncovering what is not immediately visible: the layers that define a place beyond its physical boundaries. From there, it establishes a clear conceptual and geometric framework through which the project can take shape. As the design evolves, new programmatic, technical, environmental, and experiential layers are progressively incorporated, ensuring that every decision contributes to a coherent whole. For ELIA, architecture is not the result of a single idea, but the outcome of a continuous and rigorous process of refinement.

The studio understands architecture as both a responsibility and an opportunity: a responsibility to respond intelligently to context, constraints, and resources, and an opportunity to create spaces that endure, adapt, and resonate over time. Through its work, ELIA seeks to contribute to a built environment that is not only efficient and functional, but also thoughtful, expressive, and deeply connected to the realities it serves. At ELIA, architecture is more than what the studio builds. It is how it thinks, how it works, and how it engages with the world.