There is a tell that separates developers, and it has nothing to do with marble. It is whether the people who shape the building are named. Anonymous architect, anonymous interiors, anonymous art on the lobby wall — that is a building assembled from whatever was available. Related does the opposite, loudly, and you can read the whole approach off the credits.
Key Takeaways
- —Both Thompson towers are designed by Arquitectonica, the firm that has been shaping Miami since 1977
- —Interiors are credited individually — Piero Lissoni in Mexico City, Sofía Aspe in Puerto Vallarta
- —Related employs its own art curator; the artwork in the common areas is selected, not sourced
- —Where local knowledge matters, they bring in a local partner rather than improvising — Grupo Hotelero Santa Fe in Playa del Carmen
- —Named decisions are accountable decisions, and accountability is visible in the finished room
The architect has a name
Both Mexican Thompson towers are the work of Arquitectonica — the Miami firm that, in its own words, has been "redefining and elevating Miami's cityscape since 1977." Related has worked with them for decades — Arquitectonica drew Icon Brickell for them back in Miami. That continuity matters more than it sounds: an architect who has delivered dozens of buildings with the same developer already knows what that developer will and will not approve, which removes a great deal of the friction that shows up later as a compromise in your apartment.
So does the interior designer
Mexico City's interiors are by Piero Lissoni, the Milanese designer whose work is about restraint and proportion. Puerto Vallarta's are by Sofía Aspe, whose rooms carry the warmth and colour of Mexican interiors without tipping into folklore. Playa del Carmen goes further and changes both: SEIJO on the architecture, Elias Elias on the interiors. Three buildings, three different sets of hands — because a tower on Reforma, a tower on the Pacific and a low green building on the Caribbean should not feel the same when you walk in.
A curator on staff
The detail that tends to stop people is this one. The artwork through the common spaces is described, in Related's own purchaser materials, as "curated by Related art curator." Not bought by a procurement team. Not chosen from a catalogue to fill a wall. There is a person whose job is the art in these buildings, and that is unusual enough to be worth its own piece — it gets one, later in this series.
And where they bring someone in
Keeping the important decisions close is not the same as insisting on doing everything alone. In Playa del Carmen, Related develops alongside Grupo Hotelero Santa Fe, a Mexican hospitality group with the local operating knowledge that no amount of Miami experience substitutes for. The hotel brands run the buildings day to day. Knowing which calls to keep and which to hand over is itself part of the craft.
When you walk a finished Related residence, the things you notice — the proportion of a room, the way light lands, what is hanging in the corridor — are all decisions somebody signed their name to. That is the whole argument.