After training as an architect in Poland and Spain, Izabela worked for a few years as both a freelance and associate architect for several architecture firms in Spain. In 2003 she co-founded an architecture practice, called G+W Galvez & Wieczorek arquitectura, which operated in Madrid until 2017. Their projects ranged from interior design and building design, to landscape and urban planning, exploring tools and methodologies of sensory design and experiences in urban living. G+W's works have been awarded prizes as well as published and exhibited widely, including a monographic exhibition Excepto 21, Active Cartographies, at the Fundación Cultural COAM (2008).
Situated at the nexus of academia and practice, Izabela's research focuses on the reception and production of spatial atmospheres. By defining a line of experimentation and inquiry inherent to the instrumentality of materiality and perception, her work engages in a discussion of the inextricable relation between atmosphere and place-making, revealing its affective, societal and political significance.
Over the last 15 years, her scholarly work and teaching – developed both individually and collectively – has covered fields and topics such as questions of perception and representation, somatic practices, technical mediation and the process of reflecting on and developing architecture by means of experimentation in the intersection of diverse disciplines and art forms.
Izabela's work has been presented, published and exhibited internationally, including the recent 'Works+Words Biennale of Artistic Research in Architecture' at the The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, Schools of Architecture, Design and Conservation (2019), the Spanish Pavilion Exhibition '#Becoming' at the XVI Venice Architecture Biennale (2018), the Exhibition 'Engaging through Architecture' at the Milan Design Week (2015).
She has taught undergraduate, graduate as well as postgraduate courses in Architecture and Interior Design, and has been invited as a guest critic, lecturer and examiner to a number of institutions.
Her teaching has primarily focused on design methodologies, representation, critical writing and professional practice. Prior to joining the University of Reading, she taught at Arkitektskolen Aarhus (AAA), Departamento de Arquitectura Universidad de Alcalá de Henares (UAH), Escuela de Arquitectura Universidad Francisco de Vitoria (UFV), Universidad Pontificia de Salamanca Campus de Madrid (UPSAM), and Instituto Europeo di Design Madrid (IEDM). She has also been a visiting lecturer in Energy and Sustainability at a postgraduate professional programme of Advanced Studies in Collective Housing run by ETSAM UPM and ETH Zürich.
Since 2017, building on the previous research and following G+W's ethos, Izabela has been developing a project of 'Atmospheric Architecture Agency' (AAA). Conceived as a research-based experimental practice, with a particular interest in trans-disciplinary correspondences and experimental design methodologies, the AAA focuses on applied aspects of spatial atmospheres and urban ambiances, exploring relational, sensorial, performative, affective and ecological aspects of Architecture.