Cuadro Cycling Club translates the experience of a bicycle ride into landscape architecture. Rather than recreating a literal path, the project evokes the ecological transition that unfolds when leaving Mexico City toward Cuernavaca: from temperate forests and shaded understories to volcanic terrain and warmer plant communities.

On the terrace, more than 45 native and wild species—many propagated in collaboration with Paraíso Colibrí—restore ecological relationships within one of the city’s most intensely urbanized areas. The planting was conceived not only for its visual character, but also for its ability to produce biomass, support pollinators and reintroduce seasonal change into a setting dominated by glass, steel and concrete.

Six Pinus greggii trees create a new canopy, filtering views toward the surrounding buildings and turning the terrace into a suspended forest refuge. Beneath them, species such as Oenothera hartwegii and Oenothera speciosa bring movement, softness and a distinctly wild presence to the space. Agaves, cacti, grasses and flowering perennials reinforce the transition between forest and volcanic landscape. The ecosystem is already beginning to respond: the cacti are producing fruit, while Agastache mexicana × xolocotziana attracts bees, butterflies and hummingbirds.

The interior continues the same journey through a different ecological language. Since indoor plants do not exist as a natural category, the project uses ferns, philodendrons and bromeliads adapted to low light and humid understory conditions. Set within black volcanic-stone planters, these species resonate with RIMA Arquitectura’s material palette and recall the dark rock formations encountered on the descent from the Valley of Mexico toward Morelos.

Inside and outside, the project tells one continuous story: one through ecology, the other through matter. At Cuadro, landscape is not a backdrop. It is part of the ride itself.

Date: November, 2025.

Location: Santa Fe, Mexico City, Mexico.

Team: Víctor Lara, Esaú González, Evelyn Colín, Fernando Melchor, Fernanda Jasso, Asahel Hernández, Ismael Cigarroa, Santiago Herrera & Gabriel Guízar.

Architecture: Rima Arquitectura

Photographer: Andrea Dorantes.

Status: Installed.