The news spread quickly that Wednesday afternoon. Chilean architect Eduardo Castillo, a partner of Smiljan Radic, was in critical condition following a car accident earlier that day in Santiago. The local architectural community barely had time to react before his unexpected passing at the age of 45 was confirmed the following morning, Thursday, October 5, 2017.
His death shocked the architectural world not only because of his early departure, but also because it cut short an outstanding and underappreciated career as a designer and academic, whose work explored an interest in rurality inherited from his carpenter father. While his career was closely linked to his projects with Smiljan Radic, he also practiced independently and had previously worked with Teodoro Fernández and Germán del Sol—whom he interviewed, alongside Luis Izquierdo, for his book Conversaciones informales (2009).
At the time of his passing, Castillo's work had been documented mainly in specialized journals, publications like Conversaciones informales, his personal blog—which he occasionally updated with models, quotes, and drawings of his projects—and an extensive interview uploaded to Vimeo, an oasis among generic Google search results and printed catalogs.
