Arturo Vasquez, Principal, Senior Architect, Stantec

In an interview with Invest:, Arturo Vasquez, principal and senior architect at Stantec, described how the firm’s Miami practice prioritizes long-term community value. “We design with community in mind,” Vasquez said. He discussed how integrated teams and a proof-of-concept mindset help deliver complex projects across Florida.

What is the design philosophy and core set of values that guide Stantec’s architecture practice?

Stantec is a large company, but in Miami and across Florida, we operate as a principal-led practice. The principals each bring specific responsibilities that support the success of the practice.

We are also an integrated practice. We do not only bring architecture. We also bring landscape architecture, civil engineering, urban design, and the engineering components that help a project come together as a complete system.

Our core value is straightforward. We design with community in mind. We are invested in the places where we practice because we live and work here. Many of my principal colleagues have been in Miami for decades. I have lived and worked in several regions, so I bring a different lens, but I apply it in the same direction: creating a sense of place and improving quality of life for the people who use what we build.

How do Stantec’s multidisciplinary teams collaborate to deliver holistic solutions for complex projects?

Integration is the way we work. In our Miami office, the different disciplines sit near each other, and we build teams around projects rather than operating in silos.

We bring the various professional lenses into the same room early and often. We solve problems together, instead of handing work off in sequence from one department to the next. That reduces rework, shortens decision cycles, and helps us see how design, engineering, and operations affect each other before a project is too far down the road.

We also keep the hierarchy horizontal. Each week, we meet around what I call the roundtable to review what is most impacting a project. It might be structural, landscape, design, scheduling, or financial, but it is a shared conversation grounded in delivery realities. That structure also creates space for more voices, including young staff whose perspectives can change how we see a problem.

A strong example of that approach is our work on the Broward County Convention Center expansion and new headquarters hotel in Fort Lauderdale, part of a $1 billion waterfront transformation adjacent to Port Everglades. Serving as architect of record while also providing landscape architecture, lighting design, interior design, and resiliency consulting, our teams are working in parallel with our design-build partner to coordinate architecture, engineering, coastal risk mitigation, and sustainability strategies in real time. It’s a clear demonstration of how our integrated structure translates into measurable performance on highly complex civic projects.

How does establishing common ground help when projects have multiple stakeholders?

Common ground is essential with clients and stakeholders, especially as projects become more complex. Aviation is a good example, where you are balancing operators, technical requirements, community considerations, and regulatory layers.

Early in the process, we work to establish guiding principles so decisions can be tested against shared benchmarks. We identify where stakeholders agree and where they do not. When there is disagreement, we acknowledge it and table it until we have the right framework to move forward. The goal is not to avoid conflict, but to keep it productive and tied to outcomes.

You are not always going to align every point of view immediately, but establishing decision benchmarks helps projects move forward and helps stakeholders feel heard, which builds trust.

Why is communication so critical to successful projects?

Architects can be misunderstood because the profession can hide behind specialized language. If you cannot tell the story to your daughter or your mom, it does not make sense. You have to be able to speak the language of the people around the table.

That means adapting how you communicate to the stakeholder you are addressing, whether that is a lawyer, contractor, engineer, public official, or community member. Meeting people where they are is critical to stakeholder engagement, and stakeholder engagement is critical to getting complex projects delivered well.

Effective communication also requires a deep understanding of your client’s needs and long-term vision. For example, Stantec was selected to design the new academic health sciences and clinical facility for Florida International University and Baptist Health South Florida because we clearly articulated how the project would support the future of healthcare education and service delivery. Ultimately, we designed an AI-enabled, state-of-the-art facility that will serve as a hub for clinical, research, and educational activities, reshaping the future of academic healthcare campuses.

How do you balance innovation with budgets, schedules, sustainability goals, and client needs?

Innovation is fundamental, but we do not use projects to showcase trends. We focus on innovation that solves a real problem and improves efficiency, clarity, or coordination.

Time is a major driver. Schedule impacts cost, and cost shapes feasibility. So I look for innovation that helps compress timeframes and gets teams to meaningful decisions sooner, whether that is through technology, project management, production processes, or how we communicate with a client.

We test ideas before we scale them. We use proof of concept thinking; new tools or processes are evaluated internally before they are applied broadly so they create value, not complexity.

Stantec works across multiple sectors. How do you tailor designs while maintaining a consistent identity?

We do not look at sectors in silos. The principals are accountable for the business and for the quality of work we deliver across aviation, healthcare, education, civic, and mixed-use.

Identity, for us, is not about repeating a style. It is about how we deliver a project and what that project contributes to a community. We aim to be consistent in rigor and outcomes, even when the program changes.

We also mentor younger staff by moving them through different project types so they understand how cities are made and how systems connect. Over time, that builds a culture where quality is repeatable across sectors.

At the end of the day, an architect’s legacy is what gets built and how people use it. We want to deliver beautiful buildings that improve the quality of life for the people who inhabit them.

Mixed-use and transit-oriented development are accelerating. What trends are driving that, and what challenges do these projects represent?

When I arrived in Florida 14 years ago, we did not have Brightline. Now we do, and it has reshaped how people think about mobility and growth. It has created more opportunities for sustainable places built around a mix of uses rather than being entirely car-dependent.

Transit-oriented development is intended to make daily life more walkable and connected. A concept we discuss often is the 15-minute city, where people can access essential goods and services without long trips. In practice, that means mixing housing, retail, services, and mobility so people can live and work with less friction, and so growth can concentrate around stations and corridors rather than spreading outward.

We are seeing this play out across South Florida. Homestead, for example, is experiencing a density renaissance aimed at improving livability, and Stantec is currently working with both developers and the city to design and plan for transit-oriented growth that responds directly to community needs. It’s a clear sign that even historically lower-density communities are recognizing the value of more compact, connected development patterns.

This reflects a broader shift away from separating uses into isolated districts. Healthcare is another example of that change, as care increasingly happens in community-based settings, with major hospitals reserved for specialized needs.

The challenge is that these transformations take time. Building civic infrastructure and reshaping districts can take years, so projects have to be future-proofed so they remain relevant as needs evolve.

Looking ahead, what do you see as the biggest opportunities and challenges for Stantec in shaping the future of cities and the built environment?

For me, the defining issue is scale and technology. Stantec can influence cities not only through individual buildings, but through the layers that make cities function, including infrastructure and mobility systems.

You can make an impact with one project, but you can also apply a systems vision at a regional level, and that requires understanding how people live in a place before planning what will reshape it.
Stantec’s global scale enables us to be at the forefront of how AI-driven technology and advanced data modeling inform those decisions. We’re leveraging predictive analytics and digital tools to proactively prepare cities and development for the future, from resilience planning and mobility forecasting to infrastructure capacity and climate adaptation strategies.

Cities are also recognizing that older, insular land-use patterns are not sustainable. Long-range thinking is essential, and it reinforces the need to consider social, economic, and physical sustainability together. Technology, when applied thoughtfully, allows us to test scenarios, quantify impact, and make smarter, more integrated decisions at scale.