Royal Pineda

Royal Christopher Lopez Pineda, born in 1975, is a Filipino architect and the co-founder, principal architect and CEO of Budji+Royal Architecture+Design, the practice he built with the industrial and furniture designer Budji Layug beginning in 2001. He also leads his own brand, Royal Pineda+, an advocate for Modern Filipino architecture and design, and earned his architecture degree from the Polytechnic University of the Philippines.

At around 22 he began a roughly five-year apprenticeship under National Artist Leandro Locsin, whose tropical modernism shaped Pineda's direction. In 2010 he coined the idea of practical luxury, which he defines as luxury by design at a reasonable cost using locally sourced materials suited to a tropical setting.

His signature works span residential and civic scales, from the L-shaped M House built around a central kalachuchi tree, to the New Clark International Airport terminal in Pampanga with its undulating landscape-inspired roof, to the New Clark City Athletics Stadium built for the 2019 Southeast Asian Games. He was named to Tatler Asia's Most Influential list in 2021.