Architecture · Urban health · Wellbeing
The spaces we inhabit influence the way we live, feel and think.
My work is to understand those relationships, represent them clearly, and help design built environments not only so that people live longer, but so that they can inhabit themselves better.
Liliana Salaverry
Architect specialized in urban health
Who I am
I'm Liliana Salaverry, an architect qualified in Peru and specialized in urban health.
I work at the intersection of the built environment, urban health and human capacities — translating scientific evidence so that spaces contribute to the health and wellbeing of those who inhabit them.
A practice with two dimensions: concrete assessment and consulting services, and Habitarse — the research platform that explores the deeper horizon.
See my backgroundContext
The conditions in which we are born, grow, work, live and age —along with the social, economic and political forces that shape them— have a decisive influence on health.
In urban settings, the WHO and UN-Habitat state that health should form part of urban and territorial planning, and recommend using tools that make it possible to assess how decisions about built environments affect health, wellbeing and equity.
Sources
My work sits at that point: assessing built environments and translating scientific evidence into criteria, tools and concrete proposals for those who design, plan and manage the spaces we inhabit.
What I offer
Services for spaces that care for the people who inhabit them
Space Assessment for Health and Wellbeing
Systematic assessment of built environments at urban and architectural scale — public spaces, facilities, housing and everyday-use environments — from the intersection of health, wellbeing and environmental sustainability criteria.
Learn moreTerritorial Urban Health Diagnosis
Analysis of how the environmental, social and urban conditions relevant to health are distributed across a territory, to identify spatial patterns, inequalities and priority areas.
Learn moreStrategic Consultancy for Urban and Architectural Projects
Review and guidance of urban or architectural projects to integrate health and wellbeing criteria from the design phase onward.
Learn moreHealthy Urban Planning Advice
Technical support for local governments in incorporating health, wellbeing and sustainability criteria into their urban planning documents.
Learn moreNot sure which service fits your case? Tell me briefly about your project and I'll get back to you within 1–2 working days.
Get in touchHabitarse
Space is not only inhabited. It also takes part in how we attend, perceive and relate to our own experience.
This relationship is neither automatic nor the same for everyone. What a place allows depends on its physical, social and environmental conditions, but also on whether there are real opportunities to recognise its qualities and limits, notice how they take part in our experience and choose how we relate to the place.
Habitarse researches how public space can widen those opportunities. To do so it creates and evaluates small interventions tied to specific places —questions, cues, routes or sensory invitations— that first invite us to stop, observe or listen to one quality of the place and, from that attention, to recognise how we experience it, contemplate and reflect.
It is an independent project-platform for research, representation and design, with a transdisciplinary outlook. It draws on knowledge from public health, environmental psychology and research into the relationships between the environment, attention and recovery from stress or mental fatigue, and aligns with the WHO's general health promotion framework. It integrates that knowledge into concrete, accessible and assessable urban experiences, designed to produce new urban evidence.
Existing evidence. New urban application. Rigorous evaluation.
Pilot 0 in preparation
The Habitarse pilot
I am currently preparing Pilot 0, the first applied Habitarse research with participants. Through an urban route, it will study whether a brief question or cue, tied to something already perceivable in a place, manages to direct attention towards that quality and whether any aspect of immediate experience changes.
The primary outcome to be evaluated will be the redirection of attention, through indicators defined in advance and a suitable comparison condition. Perceived restoration, affect, state calm or anxiety, perception of the environment and acceptability may be studied as secondary or exploratory outcomes.
The territory is not defined yet. Pilot 0 is looking for an alliance able to formulate the territorial question and to design, implement and evaluate this first situated test. Collaboration is open to public institutions, universities, local organizations, collectives and professionals.
Frequently asked questions
What is urban health?+
It's the field that studies how the built environment — streets, parks, housing, facilities — influences people's physical, emotional and social health. The WHO recognizes the environment as one of the main determinants of health.
Who are your services for?+
They are aimed at municipalities, architecture practices, NGOs, foundations and institutions in Spain and Latin America that need to assess environments or interventions, understand territorial health challenges, or bring health, wellbeing and equity criteria into urban projects, plans and policies.
What is the difference between the professional services and Habitarse?+
The professional services respond to specific commissions: they assess spaces and interventions, analyse territorial conditions and inform decisions on projects and plans.
Habitarse is an independent project-platform for research, representation and design. It formulates and evaluates questions about how public space can widen opportunities to recognise the qualities of places, notice how we experience them and choose how we relate to them.
Both share a foundation in urban health, environmental psychology, design and evaluation, but they serve different purposes. The findings of one are not assumed for the other.
How do I start working with you?+
Write to me with a brief description of your project, the space or the planning process you're working on. I'll reply within 1–2 working days to clarify the main need and suggest the next step.
Do you work outside Spain?+
Yes. I work in person in Spain and remotely with municipalities, NGOs and institutions in Latin America.
If you have a project, a space or a planning process you'd like to look at from an urban-health perspective — or you simply want to know more about this work — there are several ways to take the first step.