Rooted in topophilia (love for place) and genius loci (spirit of the place), Topo Club emerges from years of reflecting on how we connect to our surroundings—how our identities are shaped by them, and how and why we grow attached to certain spaces. Through photo walks, screenings, and conversations, Topo Club explores walking and collective observation as ways to research our bonds with place.

As part of this ongoing exploration, Topo Club – Film Series invites you to Index Chinatown for a screening of The Cruise by Timothy “Speed” Levitch, followed by a group discussion on placemaking and belonging.

The conversation will be led by Manuela Lourenço, Brazilian architect, photographer, and founder of Topo Club and Lucas Vaqueiro, Brazilian civic designer. Together, they’ll explore questions such as:

What does it mean to participate in the shaping and transformation of a city? How do different actors – landscapers, architects, designers, urban planners, lawmakers, politicians, theorists, tour guides, and everyday residents – contribute to this ongoing process?

Manuela Lourenço

Manuela Lourenço is a Brazilian architect, designer, photographer, and visual researcher born in São Paulo, Brazil.

Her background in architecture is central to her artistic practice, grounding her in the exploration of lived and everyday spaces — from domestic interiors to natural and urban landscapes. She is particularly interested in place identity and the emotional bonds people form with spaces — land, homeland, the domestic, the familiar. Through her work, she investigates how memory, identity, and belonging shape our sense of connection to place. As a photographer and visual researcher, she believes images have the power to evoke a place’s genius loci — a Latin expression that refers to the spirit or essence of a place.

She was the recipient of a research fellowship from Escola da Cidade Architecture Association, where she developed The Construction of the City's Image Through Photographic Narratives. Her architecture thesis, The Espigão and its Windows: Possibilities in the Void, a walking exploration of São Paulo’s remnant spaces with unobstructed views of the horizon line, was selected for São Paulo’s Biennale permanent archive and exhibited at the Mário de Andrade Library during the 2017 São Paulo Architecture Biennale.

In 2021, she received a fellowship to study Creative Practices in Photography at the International Center of Photography (ICP) in New York. She has exhibited work in group shows in New York and San Francisco, and her work has been featured in publications such as ArchDaily, Booooooom, C41, PhotoVogue, PHmuseum, Fotodemic, Musée Magazine, It’s Nice That, and Blind Magazine.

She currently works as a freelance photographer and as a teaching assistant at ICP.

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Rooted in topophilia (love for place) and genius loci (spirit of the place), Topo Club emerges from years of reflecting on how we connect to our surroundings—how our identities are shaped by them, and how and why we grow attached to certain spaces. Through photo walks, screenings, and conversations, Topo Club explores walking and collective observation as ways to research our bonds with place.

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More than 4 weeks before the program begins → 100% refund

More than 2 weeks before the program begins → 50% refund

Fewer than 2 weeks before the program begins → No refund

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