Abel Misla Villalba

Dean

Leadership for Innovation: Pioneer of Vanguard Digital Culture, Entrepreneurship and Multisectoriality on Academics

Obtaining an optimum level of territories in cities-regions require design professionals, architects and urban planners capable of transcending the status quo with advanced proposals, alternatives and methodologies.  Professionals shaped with legal, ecological, infrastructural, sociological, aesthetical and technological knowledge, promoting social responsibility, economical understanding and political legislation as an essential component of their practical environment.  Shaping these new architecture and urban professionals require a new leadership with an advanced academic formation, international experience and entrepreneurial culture.  The Dean of the School of Architecture at the Pontifical Catholic University of Puerto Rico, Mr. Abel E. Misla Villalba, is the professional synthesis of these elements constantly searching to transgress the tethers of academic and professional conventionality that dominate the contemporary scene.  His academic agenda can be defined as a deed for the creation of a new genetic, one that transcends the limits and combine the contents of technology, economy and territory.

With an international academic formation that includes studies in Louisiana, New York, Barcelona and Venice, Abel E. Misla Villalba is a pioneer of the digital culture and technological vanguard introduction into Puerto Rico’s architecture education.  His formative years with international mentors  strategically combined with his professional collaborations with the private and public sector  provide Misla Villalba with a unique background to lead and insert the School of Architecture in the global discussion during a technological and media-oriented era.  By teaching the first completely digital design courses at the Schools of Architecture of the Polytechnic University of Puerto Rico and the University of Puerto Rico, Misla Villalba opened a new breach in the formal, spatial and tectonic production, exposing dozens of students to the tendencies and vanguards of the architecture found throughout the world.xxx

Professionally, Misla Villalba has a vast experience in the development and construction industry.  As Vice-President of Strategic Planning and New Business Development at All Engineering Services Corporation, one of the ten largest real estate development enterprises in Puerto Rico, he has been leading the development of vanguard projects such as the International Business Center, the International Hotel, and Plaza Esmeralda, the last being recognized with an award at the Puerto Rico Architecture Biennial in 2002.  His leadership as a businessman has been proven by presiding the Urban Affairs and Planning Committee of the Chamber of Commerce of South Puerto Rico, and his involvement with the regional planning process in collaboration with the Alliance for Integral Development for the South Region (DISUR).  On the urban design professional field, his contributions have been of great value by developing the Framework for Physical, Programmatic and Academic Development for the Ponce and Aguadilla campuses of the University of Puerto Rico.

Misla Villalba is a defender and promoter of multisectoriality.  He is an active member of the Association of Architects and Landscape Architects of Puerto Rico (CAAPPR), collaborating in the Housing and Landscape Architecture Charrettes.  He was part of the Editorial Council of the Entorno Magazine, official means of communications of the CAAPPR.  He is also a member of the General Contractors Association and the Home Builders Association of Puerto Rico, collaborating actively on work committees such as the Special Committee for the Land-Use Territorial Planning of Puerto Rico.  One of his most significant contributions to the multisectorial agenda is PORTECO: Port Ecosystem for the South, produced from IMDICE (Multisectorial Interface for the Development of Strategic Capital Investments) at the Graduate School of Architecture of the University of Puerto Rico, in collaboration with the Port of the Americas, the Autonomous Municipality of Ponce, the Chamber of Commerce of South Puerto Rico, and state agencies.

There is no doubt that his trajectory of excellence offers the Pontifical Catholic University of Puerto Rico the security and trust of a leadership with the experience, credibility and social participation necessary for the contemporary academy.