FOUNDER

Matthew Lopez is a designer, educator, and founder of Optica Studio. His design work and research explore the interaction between technology, aesthetics, and contemporary culture. Since 2008, he has contributed to a wide range of residential, commercial, institutional, and speculative projects.

In 2024, he co-founded Optica Studio, a design practice working across various typologies and scales, including buildings, interiors, domestic objects, installations, and sculptures. The studio engages in speculative projects and commissioned work, translating contemporary architectural concepts into realized designs with a sensitivity to form and material expression.

Matthew is deeply committed to teaching and mentoring. At Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), he has led and coordinated courses such as Architectural Design Studios, Digital Constructs, Architectural Media, and Portfolio Development. He also serves as the Director of the Summer Architecture Career Discovery Program at RPI, a two-week workshop introducing high school students to undergraduate architecture studies. In 2021, he mentored Schenectady Middle School students through Rise High, a program designed to enhance STEM education and address diversity gaps in the field.

Additionally, he served as co-editor of SCI-Arc’s Offramp journal and contributed to its Summer 2017 issue, Guise. Matthew currently lives and works in Troy, NY.

FOUNDER

Miguel is a designer and educator born in La Habana, Cuba. He holds a Bachelors of Design in Architecture and a Minor in Urban Planning from the University of Florida, in addition to a Master of Architecture with distinction from the University of Pennsylvania. 

Miguel's professional experience spans a plethora of award winning offices including Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, Mapos Architects and Hume Architecture in New York, Oyler Wu Collaborative in Los Angeles, and RS&H in Florida. In 2024, he co-founded Optica Studio, a design practice working across various typologies and scales. The work includes building design, interiors, domestic objects, installations, and sculptures. The studio engages in speculative projects and pursues built commissions, translating contemporary architectural concepts into realized designs with a sensitivity to form and material expression.

He is currently a Lecturer at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) and has previously taught design studios for the MSD-AAD Program at the Weitzman School of Design. He has served as a guest critic at Pratt Institute, the University of Texas at Austin, Temple University, RPI and the University of Pennsylvania.

While pursuing his academic goals at UF and UPenn, Miguel was also the recipient of the Paul Philippe Cret medal based on excellence and consistency in design, the first place Albert F. Schenck-Henry Gillette Woodman Scholarship, the first place E. Lewis Dales Traveling Fellowship, the Architectural Academic Achievement Award, the Architecture Design Award, the International Studies Award and the Frank J. Sindelar Scholarship. His work has been widely awarded and published by Miami-Dade College, the University of Florida and the University of Pennsylvania, the Penn Museum, Surface Magazine and Pressing Matters among others.