XPIRAL

Javier Peña (b. Murcia, 1966), head of XPIRAL architecture studio, studied in Madrid and is part of a new generation of architects produced by the Madrid architecture academy who have refreshed the typical postmodern Spanish scene of the early 1990s. After completing his studies, Peña worked for various firms, including Ábalos & Herreros, before finally founding XPIRAL in 1997. Since 2001, Peña has combined architectural design and office management with teaching. He lives and works in Murcia, a city in south-eastern Spain with a population of around 450,000. Murcia is a city where the bursting of the housing market bubble has been more pronounced than elsewhere in Spain, resulting in poor quality architecture due to tight budgets. In these conditions it is difficult to find any client at all, let alone clients willing to countenance innovative architecture.