Visionary urbanist Nathalie Jean-Baptiste is redefining what it means to serve. A Marie Curie Global Fellow with URBANgrad and Guest Scientist at the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, she has spent over fifteen years blending architectural insight with social entrepreneurship.

Educated in architecture at Universidad Iberoamericana and awarded an MSc and PhD in Urban Studies by Bauhaus-Universität Weimar, Nathalie leads research that links housing, infrastructure, and climate justice in cities from Mexico to Tanzania. Her projects interweave physical, social, and institutional layers of vulnerability to craft evidence-based pathways toward inclusive growth.

“There’s a beauty in the kind of generosity that does not require a reason or a context.”

Now Deputy CEO of the Julius Baer Foundation, she drives sixteen initiatives addressing wealth inequality across Africa and Latin America.  

At MACHN26, Dr. Jean-Baptiste will headline Service as Resistance, showing how strategic acts of care can dismantle systemic barriers and build resilient urban futures.