Fernando Nieto is an architect, researcher and educator in Architecture. He is Professor of Architectural Design at the Tampere School of Architecture, Faculty of Built Environment, Tampere University (Finland), leader of the SPREAD research group (Spatial & Speculative Research in Architectural Design) and responsible professor of the Public Building Design teaching at Master's level.

He holds a PhD in Advanced Architectural Design from the Technical University of Madrid (ETSAM-UPM, 2014, Excellent Cum Laude with International Mention), a Master of Advanced Studies in Collective Housing from the same University (2006) with a scholarship for postgraduate studies from “la Caixa” Foundation, and a master’s degree in Architecture from the University of Valladolid (2004). He has studied at the National Technical University of Athens (Greece) too.

As an architect, he has held a professional practice in Spain for more than a decade, individually and in collaboration with other architects. His work has been awarded in competitions of architectural ideas such as the j5 competition of young architects in Andalusia and the first prize for the construction of the Civic Centre in Boecillo (Valladolid), a work that has been widely recognised in competitions of built works such as the Experience/Future Competition of the Higher Council of Associations of Architects in Spain (CSCAE), the 8th Architectural Awards of Castilla y León and the 5th Enor Architectural Awards. His built work Public Library and Socio-Cultural Center of Aduanas del Mar in Xàbia (Alicante) has been shortlisted for the Building of the Year 2018 Awards in the architectural platform ArchDaily (category Cultural Architecture 2017), as one of the 12 most popular Spanish built works in 2017 in the architectural platform Plataforma Arquitectura and one of the 12 inspiring projects celebrating Spanish culture in 2017 for the architectural platform Architizer. His built work has been exhibited, among others, at the 4th Conference of Architects of Spain in Valencia, the Museum of Spanish Contemporary Art Patio Herreriano in Valladolid, the Museum of the University of Valladolid and the Professional Associations of Architects of Madrid (COAM), Valladolid, Burgos and Cantabria. At present he is a member of COAM and the Finnish Association of Architects (SAFA). He is the COAM correspondent in Finland since 2015.

As a researcher, before defending his doctoral dissertation at the Technical University of Madrid, he was a visiting researcher at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (Switzerland) with a Swiss Government Excellence Scholarship for Foreign Scholars and Artists (2013-2014). After obtaining his doctorate, he worked as postdoctoral researcher of Emergent Design Methodologies at the Aalto University's Department of Architecture (2014-2018), where he took part in the EU research project ‘Human Cities. Challenging the City Scale 2014-2018’ and the research and development project ‘School as a Service’, the latter with several recognitions such as the Human City Design Award 2018 and the International Quality Innovation Prize by the Finnish Quality Association.

His research interests unfold in between the theory and practice of architecture, drawing upon the rapprochement of the poles community-privacy and its spatial implications in the built environment by intertwining research and design methodologies in architecture. He is interested in research in theory of architecture and architectural design, including public building design and housing design. He has widely published and lectured on the connections and reciprocal influence between housing standards systems and design methodologies, with a focus in the Modern Movement in Europe in the late 20s and early 30s. He is the author of the book Habitar la norma. Proyecto de vivienda y sistemas normativos (Nobuko/Diseño Editorial, 2021), and co-editor of the book Loneliness and the Built Environment (DATUTOP 40, Tampere University, 2021). His articles have been published in scientific and professional journals such as Proyecto Progreso Arquitectura, Architectural Research in Finland, Arkkitehti – Finnish Architectural Review or Constelaciones, and the research book (Ever)green Alvar Aalto. His research work has been awarded at the 14th Spanish Biennial of Architecture and Urbanism and the 11th Biennial Competition for Doctoral Dissertations in Architecture arquia/tesis 2017. At Tampere University he has been the Principal Investigator of several multidisciplinary research projects funded by the Academy of Finland and Business Finland.

His research activity is focused as well on the search for new relations between architecture and other disciplines of arts and humanities through the publishing practices. Since 2009, he is co-founder and co-editor-in-chief of the research platform HipoTesis, which has been awarded at the 8th Latin American Biennial of Architecture and Urbanism, the 13th Spanish Biennial of Architecture and Urbanism and the FAD Awards in the category of Thought and Critique. He has been external reviewer of scientific journals such as the Nordic Journal of Architectural Research, Design Studies and Ageing & Society.

As an educator, he has taught design studios in public building design and housing design at Aalto University's Department of Architecture in Helsinki (2014-2018). At Aalto University he obtained the certificate of completion of university pedagogical studies in 2018. Since 2019 he is in charge of the education in public building design at the Master’s Programme in Sustainable Architecture of the Tampere School of Architecture, where he actively participates in the supervision and evaluation of Master’s and doctoral theses too. He has been guest lecturer and critic at the Technical University of Madrid, Francisco de Vitoria University in Madrid, ETH Zurich, Aalto University and the University of Hong Kong.