Zelmira is an Argentinean architect graduated from Universidad Torcuato Di Tella in 2012. She worked for RDR Architects in Buenos Aires and participated in the edition of Toward an integral practice of Architecture, the book celebrating the twenty years of the studio. While studying at California College of the Arts in 2010, she also worked for Zen architect Paul Discoe, where she got her first approach to the Zen concepts of design and time. In 2013 she co-founded Machimbre, one of the first interdisciplinary studios in Buenos Aires, dedicated to exploring design in different fields: construction, furniture, product design, branding, and art direction.
Among her works are private apartment remodeling, interior design, and branding for coffee shops and fashion stores, awarded art and design installations such as Una Virtualidad Real in Casa Foa 2013, Ocio Inespecífico in Casa Portal 2015, and Camarote de Capitán in DAC 2017. She has also art-directed fashion editorials and campaigns for brands such as Ay not Dead in 2013 and Paruolo 2014-2015. Among other products, she has designed lamps, summer bags, and a Latin-American chair collection exhibited at Maison et Objet Paris 2016.
Along with her work, she has also developed her passion and skills for photography. She first started her education with Italian photographer Aldo Bressi in 2008, then continued improving her skills at Cfd in Barcelona in 2014, at RCR’s Hisao Suzuki photography workshop in 2016, at the Escuela Argentina de Fotografía in 2018, and at the artist Gaby Messina’s workshop in 2019.
In 2021 she published her first book, The Story Behind Recluta, a 200-page photographic documentary that sensitively portrays the heritage of Argentina's shipbuilding tradition through the wooden construction of Recluta, a sailing boat designed by her grandfather in 1942 and constructed by her father in 2017. In this book, Zelmira not only highlights the value of the transmission of knowledge through the generations but also finds the opportunity to reflect on time and continuity, a theme that fascinates her and that is present in many of her works.
Zelmira works on personal and commissioned projects.