---
title: "On the Edge — Shortlist — GENDO 48: Soldagen | Gendo"
url: https://gendo.ai/gendo-48/soldagen/selection/on-the-edge
description: "In conversation with Matheus Rudo Antoniassi Pereira de Oliveira, Luiz Eduardo Kenzo Igari Cavamura, Athena Artemisia Oliveira Vieira Cavamura — Shortlist, GENDO 48: Soldagen. Architectural competitions can be both conceptual and technically rigorous."
lang: en
---

Soldagen gallery: https://gendo.ai/gendo-48/soldagen/selection

GENDO 48: Soldagen — Shortlist

# On the Edge

Matheus Rudo Antoniassi Pereira de Oliveira, Luiz Eduardo Kenzo Igari Cavamura, Athena Artemisia Oliveira Vieira Cavamura · Rudo Cavamura

Image: On the Edge — GENDO 48: Soldagen board (https://gendo.ai/_assets/marketing/soldagen-entries/d9f22f3a-1246-4a3b-8eab-ebbd2814bd0e.jpg)

Open the live design canvas to inspect every prompt, variation and decision.

Open canvas (https://gendo.ai/app/project/3f35b298-a9a4-49df-9220-134e6b7acf61)

In conversation

> “Architectural competitions can be both conceptual and technically rigorous.”
>
> Matheus Rudo Antoniassi Pereira de Oliveira, Luiz Eduardo Kenzo Igari Cavamura, Athena Artemisia Oliveira Vieira Cavamura · Rudo Cavamura

01

## Tell us about yourself, and what brings you to competitions like this.

We are a group of graduate-level students from the University of Brasília, Brazil. Currently, only Matheus remains in Brazil, while Athena and Kenzo have moved to Japan. Athena and Matheus are architects, and Kenzo is a designer. Together, we work on architecture and design competitions.

02

## What did you design, and what were you trying to communicate?

We designed a spa that responds directly to the site, its climate, and the specific challenges in the brief. Our main concern was the project's placement within the landscape. Once the positioning was defined, it became a fundamental design tool: we established a clear architectural plane and used the profile and topography of the mountain to shape the façade and spatial organisation.

Our proposal was grounded in the idea of architecture with its "feet on the ground" — based not only on a strong concept, but also on real and buildable solutions. We studied the site through geolocated solar simulations and developed solutions for the structural system, the circulation of hot and cold water, and the transition between the cold exterior and the heated interior.

What we wanted to communicate was that architectural competitions can be both conceptual and technically rigorous.

03

## How did you approach the timeframe, and where did Gendo fit into the process?

The timeframe was extremely tight, and none of us had designed a spa before, so the process required intensive research, close collaboration, and a very clear division of responsibilities.

Rather than treating the concept, technical development, and visualisation as separate stages, we worked on them in parallel. Site analysis, solar studies, spatial organisation, circulation, water systems, structural logic and architectural expression were continuously developed and tested against one another.

Gendo became part of this workflow by helping us translate the level of architectural definition we had reached into compelling visual representations, while maintaining the coherence of the design.

04

## How has your relationship with Gendo developed?

This was our first time using Gendo, and our initial impression was that the platform was quite intuitive. We are very used to working with presentation boards and fixed formats, so using an open canvas required a slight adjustment at the beginning.

As we spent more time with the platform, the process became increasingly natural and fluid. We especially appreciated its image-processing capabilities — being able to work on several rendered images at the same time made the workflow much more efficient.

05

## What does the recognition mean to you, and what would you do differently next time?

Being shortlisted was meaningful to us. More than anything, it was rewarding to know that our work managed to stand out among many other submissions and capture the jury's attention.

Next time, we might step outside our comfort zone and place greater emphasis on highly impactful visual moments. We also noticed that many shortlisted and winning entries structured their canvases differently — more visual, more sequential, and more focused on showing the design process step by step. In a future submission, we would likely communicate the evolution of the proposal more explicitly.

Previous

HJELL
https://gendo.ai/gendo-48/soldagen/selection/hjell