For most of his career, Tommy Schwarzkopf was content working as his own boss and his own client. Born, raised, and trained in his native Ecuador, the architect and developer struck out on his own in 1973; over the ensuing decades, he and a rotating team of collaborators completed dozens of projects—mostly high-rise housing—in and around their home base in the Ecuadorian capital of Quito. Designed almost entirely in-house, the buildings helped usher the historic city into the 21st century while turning his company, Uribe Schwarzkopf, into one of South America’s largest development firms. “I’m still involved on the architectural side,” Schwarzkopf told RECORD. “I always give my point of view.”
Shortly after 2016, however, something changed. With Ecuador adopting the U.S. dollar in 2000, and with Quito undergoing a period of sustained growth, the seasoned builders—joined now by the founder’s son, Joseph—decided it was time to think bigger. As the younger Schwarzkopf put it: “We wanted to bring in talent from outside the country, to turn Quito into an architectural hub.” Beginning in 2017 with a pair of residences created by international design stars Marcel Wanders and Philippe Starck (both in collaboration with Miami-based Arquitectonica), Uribe Schwarzkopf set out on an ambitious new course, recruiting globally recognized architects from abroad to create signature multi-family housing in Quito. With a spate of projects opening recently, and others on the way, the results of that drive are currently coming into focus.
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