Manuel Ruisánchez's career has followed two parallel paths in the professional and academic sphere. Since 1982 he has been a member of the Catalonia Polytechnic University's Urban and Regional Planning Department, a Senior Lecturer in Architecture and Landscape at the Valencia School of Architecture since 1991, Senior Lecturer in Urban Studies since 1991 and a lecturer on the Barcelona School of Architecture's Landscape Master Course since 1991. He has been a visiting professor at the Washington University of Saint Louis (1994 and 1996) and also at Harvard University (2000). Since 2007, he has been a Senior Lecturer in the Landscape Laboratory at IUAV, Facoltà di Architettura di Venezia.
He has been an architect at the Projects Unit of the Barcelona Metropolitan Corporation between 1985 and 1989, and he was a partner of Ruisánchez - Vendrell between 1988 and 1997. In 1997 he founded Ruisánchez Architects. Since the start of his career he has won many building, planning and landscaping competitions. Some of the most recent examples include the Plan for “Eixample Nord” in Vilanova i La Geltrú, in conjunction with Serra-Cartagena-Vives Architects; renovations to the old Fabra i Coats building as a "Cultural Creativity Factory" in Sant Andreu, in conjunction with BAMMP; the competition for the proposed new Barcelona Harbour Fire Station; and, as leader of an international multidisciplinary team, the competition for the project and works management of the Seafront Master Plan in Salerno, Italy.
His most notable works include: the Sagrada Familia Library in Barcelona, the Mar Bella Pavilion and athletics track in the Olympic Village, and Poble Nou Park (in conjunction with X. Vendrell); the LLevant Fire Station in Barcelona and the Elderly People's Home and Day Care Centre in Parets del Vallés. His work has won several awards including the Architecture FAD for Deltebre Riumar School in Tarragona in 1997 ( in conjunction with X. Vendrell), the Catalonia Construction Prize for a Young People's Apartment Building on Tvra. de les Corts, Barcelona in 1995, and the Catalonia Social Housing Prize for the set of social dwellings in Nova Trinitat in 2008. His studio work has been published widely in the media and in professional journals, both locally and international. In 2008, Manuel Ruisánchez created the Longo bench in conjunction with Escofet. The simple geometry of this set of modular units permits great flexibility and a wide variety of combinations for a linear bench.
