Esteban Alejandro Cruz

Many of my friends and colleagues have defined me as a contemporary “Renaissance Man.” Since I was very young, I have always deeply felt a strong and humble propensity for knowledge and culture. I'm continuously learning about something, as if a student, but with an eye for experience and a genuine desire to create, and at times, protect value.

My life adventures have brought me to live and work in many different countries, and in some of the most beautiful cities and regions in Europe.

After my graduation in architecture in 1996 with a thesis on Conservation and Historic Revitalisation in the US, I went on to Venice, Italy to complete my studies in architecture in 1997. I then began my professional carrier by first working with architectural firms and various design studios specialising in monument preservation, trophy building renovation, historic urban revitalisation and cultural heritage both in Europe and the US.

Afterwards, I shifted gears and engaged the Asset Management industry, becoming since 2004 an accomplished capital project manager and consultant primarily in international practice for investment clients in real assets. I was directly responsible for multi-million euro projects and budgets in various sectors such as trophy and luxury real estate, hospitality, office, retail, and alternative energy. This happened from Milan, but I was able to experience the artistic centres of the Veneto and Lombardy, Emilia Romagna, Tuscany, Umbria, and eternal Rome and the Lazio.

At the same time this was all going on, I was also engaged along the years in numerous cultural and heritage projects in Europe as a parallel activity to my management practice. These activities started very early in my career while working in conservation and cultural heritage, and as a result, I received full membership at the International Council of Musuems (ICOM) for my early work in museum exhibit design & planning, art & architecture history, innovation technologies applied to cultural heritage and management, in addition to my subsequent endeavours in Renaissance and Classical studies with the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, for which I independently conducted research since 1995: an incunabulum and architectural treatise anomalously published in Venice in 1499 by the printing press of Aldus Manutius.