Ethos
Mar Jabouille
CULTURAL TRANSLATION | HERITAGE | PRECISED EXECUTION
Nomadic at heart, my work sits at the intersection of place, architecture, and the way space is inhabited.
It translates complexity into clear, precise design decisions: through the questions asked, the materials held, the dialogues created.
With a Master's in Architecture and a Bachelor's in Art Curation, over the past fourteen years, I have been building a foundational understanding of how the intangible moves through physical space and becomes tangible.
My explorations started in 2012, as the founder of White Walls on Black Cubes, an innovative digital platform for global art curation and online exhibitions, where I worked with international emerging artists crafting unique visual narratives.
The curatorial sensitivity —how to create connections and build stories—led me to Batik, a renowned studio in Cascais, where I learned the foundations of interior design and to connect with international clients.
I was working with the language of luxury interiors, but something was missing: I needed to understand the grammar underneath.
During the years that followed, I pursued that question, deepening my Architectural practice through the exploration of vernacular forms of construction and heritage preservation - a nomadic journey that took me across the globe.
Carrying a backpack and a curious mind, I collaborated on UNESCO-designated archaeological sites in Germany and Albania; researched natural construction in India and Iran; and immersed myself in the craftsmanship embedded in the making of a home. My research culminated in a specialization in Humanitarian Cooperation in Spain, where I lived for three years.
Learning about the making process of berbere rugs, with the Bakhtiari nomadic tribe in Iran
Demonstrating how to prepare clay to make adobes, in Germany
Daily encounters, walking to classes at the Earthen Architecture Institute, in Auroville, India
This was a journey into materiality, environment, culture, and above all, human connection. The still-developing outcome involves understanding not only how chosen materials perform in a space over time, but also why that choice matters, what it conveys, what it signifies, and how it is perceived.
This knowledge is what I have been applying to my own practice.
What distinguishes my work is what my multidisciplinary but highly cohesive path made possible:
the ability to source and specify materials with a full understanding of their provenance, their performance, and their meaning;
to recognize when a design is coherent, and every choice reinforces every other choice;
to understand how a space becomes a reflection of how someone inhabits the world.
And above all, to understand my clients in a language that speaks beyond words.