Isabel Duprat

1 · POSITION

Isabel Duprat’s place in the Library concerns landscape as part of the experience of living and staying. Her work connects private houses, shared residential grounds and a garden serving hotel guests. The strongest hospitality evidence is unusually precise: her account of BankBoston’s São Paulo garden describes a connection she designed to the neighbouring Hyatt. In Spain, Caledonian credits her landscapes at its Cortesin villas and in the team for the forthcoming St. Regis residences. These relationships support a card about landscape authorship, with the scope of each commission kept distinct. [2, 8, 11, 12]

2 · FORMATION

Duprat’s autobiographical account records her birth in São Paulo in 1954 and graduation from Mackenzie’s architecture and urbanism school in 1978. An internship with Roberto Burle Marx and botanical expeditions with Nanuza de Menezes’s USP research group shaped her education. These are complementary influences: designing a garden involves both spatial judgement and knowledge acquired through observing plants. Her subsequent work can be read through this relationship between composition and living material. [1]

3 · PUBLIC WORK AND A PRACTICAL EDUCATION

Before establishing her practice, Duprat spent six years in São Paulo’s parks and green areas department. She recalls teaching garden history and helping create training for municipal gardeners. Her own design-and-execution office and plant shop followed in 1983. In 2002, her husband, agricultural engineer and musician Manoel Dubeux Leão, joined her in coordinating execution. This chronology places practical cultivation and implementation beside design throughout her professional development. [1]

4 · THE GARDEN CONTINUES AFTER CONSTRUCTION

A landscape changes after the handover photograph. Trees grow, shade moves and the relationship between planting and architecture develops over time. Duprat’s published project accounts are valuable because they describe preparation and execution as well as the intended image. The Library reads this as a form of authorship that requires continuity: a garden depends on the initial composition, the conditions that make growth possible and subsequent care. Appearance alone cannot establish whether that process has succeeded. [2, 4, 6]

5 · BANKBOSTON: AN URBAN GARDEN WITH A HOTEL CONNECTION

Duprat dates the design and execution of the BankBoston garden in São Paulo to 1999–2002. Her account describes roughly 10,000 square metres, substantial planting above structural slabs and a programme initially intended for employees. She explicitly states that she designed the link to the neighbouring Hyatt, allowing hotel guests to use the garden. This establishes a hospitality contribution without turning a bank landscape commission into authorship of the entire hotel. [2]

6 · WHAT THE HYATT CONNECTION ESTABLISHES

Hyatt’s own 2011 release confirms that Grand Hyatt São Paulo opened in 2002. Read beside Duprat’s account, it places the garden connection within the hotel’s original development period. The relationship illustrates how a hotel’s setting can extend beyond the boundary of its primary building commission. A shared garden may affect a guest’s experience even when its first client was a neighbouring institution. The historical connection is documented; present access arrangements are not established by these historical sources. [2, 3]

7 · SOIL, STRUCTURE AND TIME

The BankBoston account describes sourcing large trees and preparing soil for planting over slabs. It is useful evidence that a mature-looking garden requires decisions made well before the final planting stage. In the Library’s reading, the landscape architect’s role includes negotiating the physical conditions that allow the design to exist. This practical dimension is particularly relevant wherever gardens sit above built accommodation, parking or other substantial structures. [2]

8 · RESTORING A PREDECESSOR’S WORK

Eloisa Santos’s study in Paisagem e Ambiente distinguishes the Moreira Salles residence’s original garden by Burle Marx from Duprat’s restoration, completed in 1999. The Rio de Janeiro house became the Instituto Moreira Salles cultural centre. The study provides independent scholarly support for an important part of her practice: working with an inherited landscape. It also keeps the original designer visible, rather than absorbing his work into the restoration architect’s portfolio. [7]

9 · A LESSON FOR HISTORIC HOSPITALITY

The Moreira Salles garden is a cultural property, not a hotel anchor. Its relevance here is methodological. Historic gardens raise questions about continuity, change and the relationship between planting and a surviving building. For hospitality research, this makes restoration a separate category of authorship from a new garden. Duprat’s participation supplies a useful comparison for future studies of hotel landscapes, without implying that she restored any hotel garden not documented in this card. [7]

10 · CASA NA AREIA: PRESERVING THE STARTING POINT

At Casa na Areia in Bahia, Duprat describes coordinating the position of Marcio Kogan’s house with existing amesca trees. Her studio dates the landscape’s design and execution to 2015–2019 and credits Nathalia Fonseca for collaboration and coordination. This is a particularly clear example of landscape entering the placement of architecture. The surviving trees were part of the conditions around which the project developed, rather than elements introduced after the house’s position had become fixed. [4]

11 · PLANTING BEFORE THE BUILDING WAS FINISHED

Duprat’s account records the planting of ninety trees before construction and their protection while the house was being built. The sequence gave new planting time to establish itself alongside the architectural work. The lesson is not that every coastal project should import the same palette or procedure. It is that landscape planning can influence the construction sequence, so that the living components of a property have time to develop before occupation. [4]

12 · THE ARCHITECTURAL PARTNER REMAINS VISIBLE

The architect-supplied Sand House record published by ArchDaily identifies the project as a 2019 house in Trancoso and separately credits Isabel Duprat Arquitetura Paisagística for landscape. It describes five enclosed volumes on a deck beneath a pergola, with trees interrupting the structural rhythm. This gives the landscape account a corresponding architectural record. The result is a collaboration whose parts can be traced, rather than a general claim that either architect or landscape designer authored everything visible. [5]

13 · LAKE GARDEN: SHAPING THE SITE

Duprat’s Lake Garden account in Bragança Paulista begins with a large, treeless residential plot and a client’s request for a lake. She describes the garden masterplan as a study of levels, views, soil and earth movement. The lake became an organising element for the site. This expands the definition of landscape design beyond a planting specification: the work concerns the shape of the ground and the relationship between house, water and the surrounding plots. [6]

14 · PRIVACY THROUGH A GROWING BOUNDARY

The same account describes surrounding the property with native trees that developed into a grove, including screening views of houses at a lower level. In a residential setting, this shows privacy being constructed through growth and topography. The Library’s interpretation is that such a boundary can serve several purposes at once: defining an outlook, giving the grounds an identity and mediating between neighbouring properties. The source does not provide a measured ecological or financial assessment. [6]

15 · CALEDONIAN CORTESIN VILLAS

Caledonian’s project record identifies six villas at Finca Cortesin, with architecture by Marcio Kogan and studio mk27 and landscaping by Duprat. This is the estate-level connection to Finca Cortesin · LHL-H-246. It is a residential commission within a wider hospitality setting. The credit does not establish authorship of the hotel’s original gardens, the golf course or the entire estate. The individual villas and the main hotel must retain separate design histories. [8]

16 · WORKING ACROSS CLIMATES

The Cortesin description emphasises local vegetation, while Duprat’s Brazilian accounts describe responses to their own sites and growing conditions. The useful connection between these projects is a method of relating planting to architecture and place. A recognisable designer can work across countries without reproducing a Brazilian garden in a Mediterranean setting. This is an editorial reading of the documented commissions; it is not a claim that their irrigation, maintenance or biodiversity performance has been independently assessed. [4, 6, 8]

17 · SHARED AND PRIVATE GROUNDS AT SOMOSAGUAS

At Somosaguas near Madrid, Caledonian specifically credits Duprat for the communal landscape and describes a contrast between dry shared areas and softer interior gardens. This distinction matters to residential hospitality: a development contains both spaces through which everyone moves and places experienced as private retreat. Landscape can make that difference perceptible without relying exclusively on walls or signage. The attribution is to the documented landscape scope, while the housing architecture remains associated with Kogan. [9]

18 · ALTOS DEL HIPÓDROMO II

Caledonian’s Altos del Hipódromo II record also identifies Duprat’s involvement in the perimeter landscape and relates the private gardens to the lighting plan. Alongside Somosaguas and Cortesin, it demonstrates a recurring professional relationship with the developer and Kogan’s practice. These repeated commissions are more useful evidence of continuity than a broad claim of international influence. They show a landscape designer participating in different residential settings within an established project team. [10]

19 · ST. REGIS RESIDENCES, CASARES: A DOCUMENTED COMMISSION

The project’s official team page names Caledonian as developer and builder, studio mk27 with senior architect Suzana Glogowski, Lázaro Rosa-Violán for interiors, Duprat for landscape and María Covarrubias for lighting. The page also states that Caledonian uses the St. Regis marks under licence from Marriott. This supports a specific connection to St. Regis Residences · LHL-R-224, while keeping development, brand and design roles separate. [11]

20 · A FUTURE PROJECT, NOT A COMPLETED ANCHOR

Marriott Development’s published account gives a target of the third quarter of 2027 for completion of the Casares residences. This remains a planned milestone, not an opening or handover event. The commission belongs in Duprat’s documented project pipeline and links her with Kogan and Rosa-Violán. Her present card rests on existing work and the historical Hyatt connection; it does not require the uncompleted St. Regis project to be treated as an operating property. [12]

21 · RELATED PEOPLE, COMPANIES AND PLACES

The strongest registered people links are Marcio Kogan · LHL-P-638 and Lázaro Rosa-Violán · LHL-P-639. Further research candidates include Nanuza de Menezes for botanical education, Manoel Dubeux Leão for execution, Nathalia Fonseca for landscape collaboration, Suzana Glogowski for architectural leadership and María Covarrubias for lighting design.

Company research should follow Isabel Duprat Arquitetura Paisagística, studio mk27 and Caledonian, including Enrique López Granados’s development role. The property connections are Grand Hyatt São Paulo under Grand Hyatt · LHL-248, the Caledonian villas within Finca Cortesin · LHL-H-246, and the future Casares scheme under St. Regis Residences · LHL-R-224. Casa na Areia, Lake Garden and the Moreira Salles restoration are supporting design studies with different uses and ownership contexts.

22 · ⚑ CANDOUR

⚑ The founder’s biography gives 1983 for the office and plant shop; a secondary online profile gives 1987. This master follows the first-person account and does not treat it as a verified corporate incorporation date. Biographical dates and execution narratives otherwise remain attributed to the studio. The Moreira Salles restoration has separate scholarly support.

The Hyatt relationship is the designed connection to the BankBoston garden, not a whole-hotel landscape credit or confirmation of current access. The Finca Cortesin connection concerns Caledonian’s villas, not the original hotel grounds. Casares completion in Q3 2027 is a published target. No handover evidence has been established for that development. Developer descriptions support project credits but do not independently demonstrate environmental performance, property value or the designer’s influence on the wider industry.

23 · ASSESSMENT

Duprat contributes a view of luxury in which the setting is active: trees affect the placement of a house, ground levels determine an outlook, and a garden can connect neighbouring institutions. Her work is especially relevant where private living and hospitality meet. The evidence is strongest when it follows a concrete decision from design into execution. That is the basis of this entry: landscape as an authored part of occupation, supported by named projects and precise collaborative credits.