Paola is passionate about connecting communities with design and cultivating collaborative agency. She serves in the alumni council through ambassadorship and creating connections among alumni and students by organizing events and opportunities for shared learning and continued exchange.
Paola is an urban designer and partner at BORDERLESS — design and research practice invested in spatial justice and equitable design based in Chicago and San Antonio. With emphasis on exchange and communication across disciplines, Borderless explores creative civic design and interventions that address the complexity of urban systems and social equity by looking at intersections between architecture, urban design, infrastructure, landscape, planning and community engagement processes.
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Zeerak is the first member of the Alumni Council from the Master in Design Engineering program. He works with GSD students and faculty to expand the school’s scope and influence in the areas of technology and internationalization.
Zeerak’s decade of experience in the tech industry allows him to build conversational bridges between software engineers, product managers, and designers. His expertise is in understanding audiences historically underserved by modern technology; for example, he builds novel software for Urdu and Arabic, expanding the usefulness of modern software to South Asia. His work has been recognized by the Industrial Designers Society of America, the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence, Amazon, and the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture, among others.
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Fallon splits her engagement in Alumni Council affairs between the Ambassadorship Committee and the Diversity and Inclusion Task Force. With the latter, she helped the GSD’s Associate Dean for Equity, Inclusion and Belonging develop and launch the Racial Equity Fund. She also facilitates involvement of GSD alumni throughout the Gulf South in Alumni Council and GSD initiatives, programming, and curricula, e.g. Design Impact, and Design Critics.
Within academia, as a public official and through nonprofit consulting, Fallon analyzes hazards to heritage and adapts heritage to hazards. Her work in front-line communities threatened by climate change revolves around rehabilitation, revitalization, and recovery of real estate disproportionately impacted chronically and acutely by deterioration, disinvestment and disasters, especially structures and streetscapes of historically, economically, and culturally significant to Black, Indigenous and immigrant populations on the Atlantic, Pacific, and Gulf coasts. She also informs how we preserve and protect through community and public service, lending expertise to nonprofits such as the African American Heritage Trail of Martha’s Vineyard and public authorities such as New Orleans Redevelopment Authority, the Louisiana Governor’s Climate Initiative Task Force, and the national Advisory Council on Historic Preservation. For more than two decades she has worked to diversify built environment professions and address inequities of their practices, pipelines, and pedagogies from within professional organizations
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Raised by a father from Italy who taught high school in California, and a mother who worked for the airline industry, Mari grew up with a passion for travel, and a curiosity about people, life, and the built environment in different parts of the world. This background, in turn, has deeply shaped her career in the hospitality industry. Mari loves this industry for its ability to make compelling design accessible. When we travel to celebrate weddings, reunite with family and friends, or discover new places, hospitality environments create the settings for some of our most memorable experiences.
Most recently, Mari joined Airbnb to lead the Environments Design team, the group within Airbnb responsible for the physical expression of the brand. A Global Director, Environments Designs, Mari oversees the team that designs Airbnb’s offices worldwide, and collaborates with real estate developers to create new models of housing design that can support Airbnb’s model of resident hosting.
Previously, Mari was Vice President of Design Services for Hyatt Hotels, where she oversaw design for Hyatt’s portfolio of full-service hotel brands, throughout the Americas region. As Senior Vice President of Design for the Morgans Hotel Group, Mari was responsible for multiple award-winning designs. She was also Global Director of Design for St. Regis Hotels at Starwood Hotels and Resorts. Before transitioning to in-house design roles, Mari got her start as Studio Director for Aero Studios Limited in New York City. There she oversaw new construction and renovation projects, both residential and commercial, including the hotel 60 Thompson and Giorgio Armani’s private residence in Manhattan.
Francisco “Pancho” Brown is a Nicaraguan designer and communication strategist. He is a Senior Editor and Engagement Manager at Metropolis Magazine, and co-founder of Micropolitan Studio, a multidisciplinary art and design collective selected by the New Museum’s NEW INC program.
Pancho is also a correspondent for Mexico’s Arquine Magazine and serves on the Steering Committee for US Architects Declare.
Pancho’s multidisciplinary and international career made him want to engage with current and recently graduated students, especially international ones, to support their transition into creative professional work in the US.
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Anna begin as a member of Alumni Council in 2022 and currently serves on the S/AX committee and the AC Executive Committee.
Anna has dedicated her career to weaving nature, culture, and history into urban landscapes. At every scale, she is committed to engaging communities and striving to create designs that reflect both the current and future communities’ needs. Her work ranges from city-wide parks plans that engage communities in multiple languages, to designing historic landscapes to meet 21st-century needs, to building Europe’s largest urban waterfront.
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Nina is currently co-chair of the GSD Alumni Council. In partnership with Riki Nishimura, she leads the Alumni Council and steers the Alumni Council Executive Committee. Prior to this role, she was actively involved in the S/AX Committee, helping to facilitate alumni and student connections through in-person gatherings, mentoring, and online panels focused on relevant, student-oriented topics.
Nina’s professional experience as a landscape architect is informed by a commitment to the design community through teaching, research, and volunteering. She lectures often and serves as a design critic, both nationally and internationally. She is a member of the American Society of Landscape Architects and a former adjunct faculty member at Carnegie Mellon’s School of Architecture as well as emeritus board member of the Landscape Architecture Foundation. Her work has received national recognition from the American Society of Landscape Architects, the Landscape Architecture Foundation, and the Architectural League of New York. As a member of the GSD Alumni Committee, she is an active ambassador of the GSD.
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Florence serves as a member of the Ambassadorship Committee, where she works to connect alumni in Hong Kong and the Greater Bay Area through active engagement, communication, and events.
An architect with extensive experience in complex large-scale projects in China, her completed works include landmark towers in Hong Kong, Shenzhen, and Guangzhou. She is a board member of the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat’s Hong Kong chapter, where she promotes the sharing of knowledge on tall building design. In 2022, Florence served as president of AIA’s Hong Kong chapter, where she led the establishment of a mentorship program to connect students and emerging professionals with seasoned architects.
Previously, Florence also served as an adjunct faculty member at the Chinese University of Hong Kong School of Architecture, and she is a frequent design critic and speaker at local architectural schools and international conferences.
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Sekou Cooke is an architectural practitioner and educator based in Syracuse, New York. He is currently Assistant Professor at Syracuse University’s School of Architecture where he teaches design studios and seminars that value breadth of exploration over formulaic production. Through his professional practice, sekou cooke STUDIO, he brings thoughtful processes and rigorous experimentation to a vast array of project types from commercial and residential works in New York, New Jersey, and North Carolina, to mixed-use projects and tenant improvements in California, to speculative developments in Liberia and his native Jamaica.
Through his research, practice, and other academic endeavors, Sekou hopes to leave an equally lasting impact on ivory towers and underserved communities.
Sekou holds a BArch from Cornell University and an MArch from Harvard University, and is licensed to practice architecture in New York and California.
Biography coming soon…
As an Alumni Council member, John’s efforts focus on student engagement and support. He is a student mentor and co-chair, with Beth Roloff, of the Unsung Hero Award selection process.
An architect and educator, John is the founding partner of di Domenico + Partners, and an adjunct faculty member at NYIT. The work of his studio explores innovation and sustainability in the civic realm. Recent projects include the METRO Silver Line and the development of a sustainable landscape for the United Nations. He is an avid mixed media painter and his work is often visual commentary on current projects. John received a Bachelor of Architecture degree from The City College, and his MAUD at the GSD. He was a Fulbright Scholar in Rome. John serves on the Boards of The New York Transit Museum and Coney Island USA.
Hazel Edwards has been a member of the Governance and Student Exchange committees.
She has served as a tenured faculty member in city planning, urban design, and architecture programs at three universities for more than 20 years. Her role as academic, researcher, and practitioner has given her a unique perspective from which to engage with a wide range of people. Overall, the common thread of her academic, scholarly, and professional endeavors has been improving livability for all citizens. She has worked to increase diverse voices, particularly those of women, through innovative educational and mentoring techniques that have nurtured a new generation of planning and design professionals who express a broad spectrum of cultural values in their work with the built environment.
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Jennifer is an architect, educator, and advocate with over 15 years in professional practice. She is a registered architect in Ontario, Canada (previously registered in Nova Scotia, Canada), a principal at Place of Work Architecture Studio (Halifax/Toronto, Canada), and assistant professor at Toronto Metropolitan University’s Department of Architectural Science (Toronto, Canada). Past associate at superkül (Toronto, Canada) and MacKay-Lyons Sweetapple Architects (Halifax, Canada). Jennifer previously taught at the undergraduate and graduate level at University of Waterloo, Dalhousie University, and the GSD (Career Discovery). Current chair of Building Equality in Architecture Toronto, Executive Committee (BEAT). Current mentor for Ontario Association of Architects Internship Program, past mentor for Nova Scotia Association of Architects Internship Program. She is also a Mentor with Harvard Women in Design (WiD), Harvard Mentor Collective, Carleton Alumni Program. Planning committee for International Landscape Collaborative (GSD initiated organization).
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Rickie Golden is Vice President, Real Estate Development at Alexandria Real Estate Equities, where she oversees the master planning and development of life science development projects in Greater Boston. Previously, Rickie was Vice President, Development at The Davis Companies and President of JECSP, a spin-off company of Corcoran Jennison Companies focusing on large-scale, mixed-use urban projects with a public benefit strategy. A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania (Bachelor’s, 2005, Art History) and Harvard University Graduate School of Design (Master’s, 2012, MDes Real Estate Development), Rickie worked in development in New York City and at The Museum of Modern Art prior to attending GSD. She is originally from outside Philadelphia.
She is a member of the Board of Directors of The American City Coalition, a member and former Vice Chair of the Urban Land Institute Responsible Property Investment Council and has held a variety of leadership positions at CJP. She has lectured and spoken on panels at Harvard College, Boston College, Boston University Law School, Harvard University Graduate School of Design, The Boston Society of Architects and the Urban Land Institute.
Alicia is a London-based associate at Gensler. A landscape architect and urban strategist who has practiced in Spain, the US, France, and the UK, her work includes the development of projects at different scales , all the way from strategic concept frameworks to construction detailing. Alicia´s interests rely on the interface between landscape, architecture, ecology, and anthropology, with a focus on delivering sustainable and culturally sensitive projects that engage well with their user communities.
While pursuing her studies in landscape architecture at the GSD, she worked as a research assistant at Exuma Lab, developing sustainable proposals for empowering local Bahamian communities. In addition, she received first prize in the Northeast Los Angeles (NELA) Placemaking Design Competition for her proposal to revitalize the Los Angeles river titled “Arroyo Seco Artcupuncture.” Alicia has been a visiting professor for the Master in Landscape Architecture program at Greenwich University, and is regularly invited as a guest critic at other London design schools. Since moving back to Europe , she has been very active in the Harvard Alumni community, acting for several years as the co-chair of the Harvard Club of the United Kingdom’s Young Alumni chapter.
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Gregory joined the Ambassadorship committee within the GSD Alumni Council and is focused on organizing events that will engage alumni and raise awareness of the GSD within the broader design community and the public. He hopes to leverage his involvement in a broad range of professional associations, including the NYC chapter of the AIA,, the NY Metro Chapter of the APA, and the Harvard Alumni Architectural and Urban Society (HAAUS) in order to reach, and to bring together, a broader audience for events highlighting the endeavors, achievements, and contributions of Harvard GSD alumni, faculty, and students.
Gregory is a New York based architect and urban designer and an Associate Principal with Henning Larsen. His work focuses on engagement with the public realm through civic, mixed-use, and urban design projects. Previously, he worked with Grimshaw, Polshek partnership (now Ennead), Rafael Vinoly and Deborah Berke. Gregory has taught at the Boston Architectural Center, the New York and New Jersey Institutes of Technology, and the New York City College of Technology, CUNY. Additionally, he has been an invited juror or lecturer at Columbia, the University of Pennsylvania, Harvard, Yale, Parsons, City College, and Pratt.
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Prior to starting her own practice in 1985, Judith Heintz worked for the fledgling Central Park Conservancy where she, with 3 colleagues, prepared the plan to guide future projects and operations the Park, published by MIT Press in 1987 as Rebuilding Central Park: A Management and Restoration Plan. Intentionally not called a Master Plan, the plan was conceived to be flexible, to respond to new social and cultural needs, new or evolving ecologies, and changing resources.
Working within various organization structures (Judith Heintz, ASLA, Heintz/Ruddick Associates, JHLA, WRT and sassafras55), she has worked on many projects at a variety scales: from regional, city-wide, and local to interventions on an intimate micro scale.
Using a process developed over many years her design goal is to create connections – between places, people, and periods of time – within an existing landscape, bringing out or enhancing qualities that are already perceptible just under the surface. In both public and private projects collaboration with the user/client means that the work recedes as the client settles in. The landscape seems inevitable and right, the product of gradual evolution, a place where things can still change and grow through time.
In addition to her Master of Landscape Architecture from the GSD, Judith received a BSLA from the Ohio State University (summa cum laude) and a Master of Architecture from Columbia University GSAPP.
LaShawn Hoffman serves on the GSD Ambassadorship Committee and the President of the Loeb Fellowship Alumni Association.
LaShawn M. Hoffman is a civic and community leader who advocates for safe, healthy, and economically viable communities. He leads a boutique consultancy focused on the intersection of public health and community development. LaShawn has spearheaded a wide range of programs focused on community improvement, public health, and economic growth collaborating with community advocates, academic partners, and agencies to promote partnerships using the community-based participatory research model. His work has promoted neighborhood preservation and socio-economic and cultural diversity through housing development, public health, social services, civic engagement, and advocacy. LaShawn’s leadership is evident through his appointments to local and national taskforces and committees.
Biography coming soon…
As a recent addition to the Alumni Council, Courtney looks forward to deepening her committee engagement and continuing her engagement with students as a guest lecturer and critic in both urban planning and architecture.
After attending the GSD, Courtney served as the senior planner for Roxbury and the Back Bay, where she was instrumental in designing language that became the template for anti-displacement criteria in RFPs for the city of Boston. Later, she was Boston’s first director of cultural planning, where she practiced urban planning with a people-first lens to support frequently under-resourced populations. Courtney has served as a design critic in architecture, landscape architecture, and urban planning, and has been a panelist on topics related to design, diversity, urban planning, and cultural affairs. She was a board member for the Boston Society of Architects from 2020–2022 and is currently on the board of the Harvard Club of Boston.
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Mark participates in the Student Alumni Exchange Committee and holds occasional student and alumni events in Denver.
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As a new member of the AC, Thomas wants to focus on Europe and help the GSD’s current and prospective students from the region to connect. He was also the MAUD/MLAUD class marshal of ’09.
Thomas is a director at Buro Happold and their head of Sustainability and Climate in Europe. He is a leader in resilience, carbon, and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) frameworks on scales spanning from individual buildings to districts, cities, and regions. He leads teams across the region on integrated development, strategic planning, mobility, sustainability, and energy, guiding them toward the goal of zero carbon.
His professional experience includes working as an architect for Stefan Behnisch , Qingyun Ma , and Kenneth Yeang , as an urban quality consultant for Jan Gehl, and as an engineering advisor and consultant for Buro Happold. He also worked for the European Commission as an expert on sustainable urbanization. He has lived and worked in Germany, Denmark, the US, Malaysia, China, and Vietnam. He is a licensed architect and urban planner in Germany and an appointed member of the German Architects of Architects (BDA). Thomas teaches frequently across Europe and holds various teaching positions in urban development and sustainability.
He is a co-initiator and co-founder of the German Sustainable Building Council (DGNB) and member of the board of directors. He has received numerous scholarships, including a Fulbright to attend the GSD and MIT, and he is a fellow of the Mercator Institute for Chinese Studies and the BMW Foundation Herbert Quandt .
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has been working with the Harvard Urban Planning Organization to develop an alumni mentorship partnership with the Alumni C
Much of Zakcq’s practice has been based on experiences as someone from a low-income background trying to find space within design pedagogy, practice, and culture that lacks racial, socio-economic, and gender diversity. He is now a partner at Mend Collaborative, a new design firm based in Minneapolis and Austin. Mend Collaborative was founded with the goal of developing a supportive and sustainable design practice that understands that professional achievement and productivity must be an outgrowth of life/work boundaries and personal fulfillment. The firm values collaborative work, investing in well-being and development as professionals and people, and being present for communities.
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Anne-Marie is interested in mentoring and connecting students with people and organizations that reflect the diversity of design practices and influence on the world. In 2020 she organized a “Profiles of Practice” J-Term session with Womxn in Design that brought together GSD alumni who shared insights from their personal and professional journeys.
Anne-Marie is passionate about increasing understanding of the built environment and its impact on our lives. She has developed and led projects and programs in design firms, educational institutions, and nonprofits that engage people in design and planning and foster more beautiful, just, and resilient communities. Anne-Marie regularly contributes to national and international forums on design and cities. She is a Lecturer in Urban Planning at the GSD and serves on the Boston Civic Design Commission and Association of Architecture Organizations board of directors. She holds a BArch from Carnegie Mellon and was a 2012 Harvard Loeb Fellow.
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Thomas has served on the Alumni Council since 2016, on the Ambassadorship Committee. He worked with other committee members to establish the GSD Alumni Award, now in its third year, and serves as co-chair of the jury for the 2024 cycle. He has also been actively involved in the development and presentation of online Design Impact sessions, and was the moderator for a session on public commemoration in a day-long webinar event in September 2021. In his work as a public architect in Washington, D.C., he has participated in or hosted several alumni events in the city.
Thomas has worked in the allied disciplines of architecture, urban design, and historic preservation over the past 30 years– in a mix of professional practice, public sector, academic, and advocacy organization roles. In his current role, running the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, the federal design review agency in Washington, D.C., he is closely involved in the design of public architecture, cultural expression and its history, and forms of commemoration. Thomas manages a publication program at the CFA, where he has produced two major volumes on D.C. public architecture, with several more currently in production. He is a frequent speaker, panelist, and contributor on these topics, particularly as they relate to cultural history, the design and history of Washington, D.C., and the expression of national values in built form.
John Mann is a land use planning policy advisor for the Secretary of the Navy and the Chief of Naval Operations, the senior civilian and military leaders of the U.S. Department of the Navy. He is engaged in long-range planning, development and real estate strategies for naval installations world-wide to support U.S. foreign policy objectives.
He started his employment with the Navy in 2007 where he led the Navy’s planning division for the Washington, DC region. Key efforts his planners managed included the relocation of the National Museum of the United States Navy; master plans for the region’s installations; and coordination with local and federal planning and review agencies.
From 2002 to 2007 John served on the staff of the National Capital Planning Commission, the federal government’s planning agency for the National Capital Region. His work at the Commission addressed the shifting landscape of 21st century development; the urgent actions necessary to combat the threats from climate change; and the opportunities created by advances in technology, challenging traditional ideas of mobility and workplace. From 1987 to 2002 he worked as a land use planner for the Department of Defense and as a consultant in the private sector, giving him a broad perspective on differing approaches to administration and governance.
John is a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners and is a site visitor for the Planning Accreditation Board, the organization which accredits graduate and undergraduate planning programs in North America.
Jeffrey served on the council for nine years beginning in 2009 and co-chaired the Ambassadorship Committee for the last four years of that. He then went on to become one of the Appointed Directors from the GSD to the Harvard Alumni Association (HAA) and is serving his second term.
Jeffrey leads the planning and design of multi-dimensional, complex projects. His award-winning work for cultural and educational institutions shows how sustainable design can enrich the beauty, function, and performance of architecture.
As a founding partner of MBB Architects In New York City, Jeffrey melds bold design vision with a commitment to addressing diverse stakeholder needs and interests. From greening historic buildings to planning campus-wide sustainability upgrades, he synthesizes technical, cultural, economic, and health criteria. His expansive definition of sustainability includes not only high-performance building systems,
but also creating places that people love and care for over generations.
Jeffrey earned a Master of Architecture degree from the GSD and a Bachelor of Science in Architecture degree from the University of Virginia. At Harvard he received a Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture Research Fellowship and the post-graduate Wheelwright Prize.
Cultivating architecture’s civic role, Jeffrey has held Board, Secretary, and committee chair positions with the New York Chapter of the American Institute of Architects. He has served as a board member of Community District 7 in Manhattan and as a member of the Zoning Board of Appeals for the Village of Saltaire, New York. He also teaches an undergraduate course on sustainable design at New York University.
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Alpa Nawre is Associate Professor in the Department of Landscape Architecture at University of Florida, and Partner at her design practice, Alpa Nawre Design. Alpa is a recipient of the Council of Educators in Landscape Architecture Award for Excellence in Design Studio Teaching, Harvard University’s Dumbarton Oaks Mellon Fellowship in Urban Landscape Studies, and Landscape Architecture Foundation’s Fellowship for Innovation and Leadership. Issues pertinent to the design of urban water infrastructure, and resource challenges in the context of rapidly urbanizing, developing countries inform her research, teaching and practice. Her writings have been published as books chapters and in journals such as Landscape Journal, JoLA and Thresholds. Alpa is a licensed landscape architect in Kansas, a licensed architect in India, and a LEED AP. She holds a Masters degree in Urban Design from Harvard Graduate School of Design, a Masters in Landscape Architecture from Louisiana State University, and a Bachelor in Architecture from NIT, Raipur, India. She has worked internationally in design offices in India, USA, UAE, and Switzerland and serves on the editorial board of JAE, the Journal of Architectural Education.
Riki Nishimura, AIA, AICP, is a Principal at Populous, a global architectural design firm specializing in creating environments and venues that draw communities and people together. He is a licensed architect, certified planner, and urban strategist with over two decades of experience in the strategy and design of our cities. His specialty is providing design strategies for maximizing value for all stakeholders for next-generation Venue integrated destination communities. He approaches design from a collaborative and evidence-based perspective, resulting in the design and implementation of world-class experiences. In the process, he balances visionary and fiscally responsible development to achieve memorable, sustainable, and enduring places in both the public and private realms.
Riki’s experience includes award-winning projects that create unique and extraordinary user experiences and optimize the functionality and viability of venue-integrated mixed-use and entertainment districts, mixed-use urban regeneration districts, next-generation waterfronts, corporate and technology workplace campuses, university campuses, and urban cultural parks.
Committed to furthering sustainable strategies, practices, and contributions to the real estate community, he is active in the Urban Land Institute (ULI). The ULI recognized him in 2016 with the 40 Under 40 award. He contributes to the ULI Advisory Services and serves on the ULI Americas Executive Committee, the Global Exchange Product Council, and the ULISF Executive Board. Riki is the Co-Chair of the Harvard GSD Alumni Council and serves on the Board of Directors of the Harvard Alumni Association. He actively participates as a design review critic at Harvard, Stanford, UC Berkeley, and UCLA, and he has held an appointment at Stanford University as an adjunct lecturer in Risk and Resilience at the School of Engineering. He received a Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Toronto and a Master of Architecture and Urban Design from Harvard University.
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Chelina has been an active member of the GSD alumni community as a Connect mentor, critic, and lecturer, and she has hosted many summer interns at her mission-driven firm, Kounkuey Design Initiative (KDI). In her new position, she looks forward to expanding the reach of the Council through her global design network across the Americas, Europe, and Africa.
Chelina believes in the power of community-engaged design to advance racial, environmental, and economic equity in neighborhoods and cities. With KDI, she aims to bring good design to places where it is not often found and to connect localized design interventions to large-scale policy change. Her expertise includes gender equity and the built environment, child-friendly cities, and design for climate justice. In 2022, Chelina received the GSD Alumni Council Award, and KDI received the National Design Award for Landscape Architecture. Chelina has lectured globally on KDI’s community-engaged mode of practice and taught at the GSD; she currently holds a teaching appointment at UCLA.
Stacey Pennington currently participates on the Ambassadorship Committee. In 2021, she was a member of the Strategic Planning Committee.
Stacey is the founder and principal of SLP Urban Planning, as well as a strategic advisor for the World Woman Foundation and the San Diego-based real estate development firm Lankford & Associates. Stacey’s point of view, whether in her work as an urban planner, community organizer, or civic leader, is shaped by a commitment to challenging the parameters of traditional real estate development and community engagement.
Currently, Stacey’s work with the World Woman Foundation is focused on designing and producing the 2023 Sustainability Forum, which is the launchpad for a year-long initiative focused on the importance of human-centered design at the intersection of urban planning, energy, the digital economy, food systems, and women’s health. This initiative is one of the ways that the World Woman Foundation fulfills its mission of empowering women and girls to reach their full potential through education, mentorship, and community engagement through the lens of sustainability.
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Ryley Poblete, LEED AP, is a Senior Associate at Gensler in Los Angeles, CA. There he works on large scale projects ranging from corporate, mixed use, and institutional work with a focus on urban design and planning. Prior to Gensler Ryley worked for seven years at HOK on a range of projects spanning from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology to Chevron’s proposed corporate headquarters expansion in downtown Houston.
Ryley graduated from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design in 2014 with a focus on Architecture and Urban Design. This opportunity allowed him to take on an expanded dialogue around the topic of resource development and planning in his thesis regarding the Athabasca Oil Sands. He completed his undergraduate studies at The University of Houston where he graduated Summa Cum Laude and received the AIA Henry Adams Medal and Certificate (salutatorian). Ryley’s thesis “Bayou Fjords,” which focused on the Houston Ship Channel and the utilization of brownfield developments over time, was the recipient of a design award and was displayed at the 2012 Texas Student Biennial Exhibition.
A Canadian citizen and American resident, Ryley lives and works in the Houston area with his wife, Rorie Poblete.
Gil has been consistently involvement with the GSD in various roles: as a member the GSD Alumni Council where he serves on the Ambassador Committee, as a member of the Harvard University Alumni Real Estate Board, and as a member of the Josep Lluís Sert Council since 2015.
Gil is an accomplished and award-winning professional and civic leader with expertise in several interrelated fields including real estate, urban planning, historic preservation, sustainability, design, infrastructure, community and economic development. He has worked as an entrepreneur and held positions in the private, public and non-profit sectors.
Gil draws on his unique multidisciplinary and multi-sectoral experience, local knowledge, and national/international perspective to holistically approach and successfully execute challenging, high-profile real estate and urban redevelopment projects that are a win-win for business, community, environment, and government. Gil is involved in several community and professional organizations including ULI (Urban Land Institute), American Planning Association/American Institute of Certified Planners (APA/AICP), and founder of Open House Atlanta, a non-profit dedicated to showcasing the built environment.
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As a new addition to the Alumni Council, Estello is particularly interested in sharing resources and fostering a welcoming community for recent alumni and emerging professionals.
Estello is an associate landscape architect at the Cambridge-based firm Agency Landscape + Planning, working on and managing the design, planning, and construction of public projects of varying scales and types across the United States. Prior to receiving his Masters in Landscape Architecture from Harvard’s Graduate School of Design in 2019, where he was the 2018 University Olmsted Scholar, he studied biology and English at Vassar College. Estello has served as a co-chair for the Boston Society of Landscape Architects Emerging Professionals and is an active member of the BSLA’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion working group.
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Rob is delighted to be joining the Alumni Council this year; he is a frequent mentor to recent GSD graduates and welcomes each opportunity to connect. Rob and his firm opened their New York office early this year to a group of current students and young alumni for a talk about practice and office culture after the pandemic.
Rob founded ROGERS PARTNERS Architects + Urban Designers in 2013 based on more than 30 years of experience blurring the boundaries between urbanism, landscape, and architecture. Major civic and institutional works include the award-winning Henderson Hopkins School in Baltimore, the new St. Pete Pier in Florida, and the reimagined Constitution Gardens on the National Mall. Rob has served as a critic and professor at academic institutions around the country, including Harvard, Yale, Columbia, and Rice Universities and the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc). Rob currently chairs the advisory committee for Rice Architecture and recently completed a four-year term as chair of Open House New York. Rob is a fellow of the American Institute of Architects.
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Euneika’s leadership within the Alumni Council involves strengthening equity diversity and inclusion efforts through the support of the and through engagement with students by developing regional, on-the-ground projects in which students can apply a variety of design skills. one-on-one mentoring and portfolio and thesis reviews as well as courses rooted in social design of our region.
Euneika is a creative researcher at the Destination Design School of Agricultural Estates. Working at the intersection of conceptual and material practice, she develops projects that deal with the natural environment’s role in culture, examining the significance of mainstream industrial production in developed countries and local production in developing countries. Her current work explores the social and philosophical dimensions of reparation ecology, the curious intersections of the humane and inhumane, and art as a means of engagement, education, critique, and healing. She is interested in co-designing global curricula and workshops that address ecological crises.
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Adriana collaborated on Volume 5 of the Design Impact Series, specifically Global Gardens, focusing on Latin America. Reaching out to GSD Alumni in the region and portraying the richness of our natural assets, the role they play globally and regionally, showcasing alumni work and their involvement with communities, landscape, mobility (physical and social), and overall social impact. Questions were centered on our values as a region in transition but also as fertile ground for innovation in softer landing for required infrastructure for development. Special emphasis on cultivating and safeguarding cultural knowledge as a tool for design innovation, sustainability, equity, inclusion, and justice.
Latam, and former President Harvard Club of Mexico. Envision Sustainability Professional, Project Designer | Project Architect for sustainable beach house, Puerto Escondido, for a refurbishment of a 1920´s house/art gallery in Condesa, Mexico City. Former Governance and Finance for Metropolitan Development consultant, for the Valley of Toluca, State of Mexico. Project Coordinator for the St Regis Hotel and Residences, Mexico City in collaboration with PCP Design Architects, YabuPushelberg Interior Design Firm, Starwood Hotels Luxury Brand and Ownership. Contributed to the new governing alignment for the Mexican Association of Urban Planners (AMU) and is the former Vice President of Legislation and Governance.
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Beth Roloff, AIA, LEED AP BD+C is a Project Architect and Associate at MSR Design in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She has experience working across many complex building typologies, global locations, and architectural scales in the United States and Middle East. Her design work includes libraries, higher education, office, healthcare, science and technology, and mixed-use development projects that focus on creating architecture that is sustainably integrated into the urban fabric.
She holds a Master in Architecture from the Harvard University Graduate School of Design and received a Bachelor of Science in Architecture, with high honors, from the University of Virginia.
David has had the pleasure of participating in several Graduate School of Design Open Studio explorations in the last several years, focusing on identity, accessibility – the invitation to participate – and engagement, to give opportunity for communities to see themselves in the resultant design explorations. He has participated in panel discussions and lectures at the HGSD with a focus on empathy and design practices through the Womxn in Design series, as well as “Pandemic Practice: Leading a Design Firm in a Time of Crisis,” among others. David was honored to host Harvard’s gathering at the 2018 Conference on Landscape at his Philadelphia studio and welcomes visits from GSD students and alum at any time.
David’s burgeoning landscape architecture, urban design, and planning practice, DAVID RUBIN Land Collective, is passionately committed to an empathetic design problem-solving approach in an effort to assure those that participate in landscapes of the studio’s design can self-identify within those sites. As a nationally-certified LGBT Small Business Entity (SBE), Land Collective focuses design excellence with a priority on socially resilient and inclusive landscapes, so that the breadth of constituency can “see themselves” in the resultant works. David has developed and led complex design and planning projects in a wide range of American cities, from Detroit to Los Angeles to Washington, D.C., always with a focus on empowering constituency to foster identity. He is a frequent contributor to national forums on the design of cities and was recently appointed by the State Department to The Bureau of Overseas Building Operations (OBO) Industry Advisory Group to advise the U.S. Government on best practices in landscape architecture.
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Biography coming soon…
Ming Thompson is co-founder of Atelier Cho Thompson (ACT), a New Haven- and San Francisco-based multidisciplinary practice working between architecture, interiors, graphics, and strategy. ACT’s work frequently blurs the boundaries between typologies, as they draw inspiration from their work in schools, museums, offices, restaurants, and homes around the world.
Ming was a recipient of the AIA Young Architects Award in 2020, and her firm has been honored with the IIDA Foundation Visionary Award and The Architect’s Newspaper’s Young Architects Award. ACT’s work has been featured in Metropolis, Architect Magazine, Interior Design Magazine, Dezeen, Divisare, and at the Venice Architecture Biennale. Educated at Yale College and the Harvard Graduate School of Design, Ming has taught at the California College of the Arts and has served on design juries around the US. She is a co-founder of A Rising Tide, an initiative to cultivate leadership among and increase the visibility of Asian and Pacific Islanders working in design for the built environment.
Outside of architecture, Ming is a first-year adviser at Yale and actively involved in her community in New Haven, serving on the boards of the Yale-China Association and the New Haven Preservation Trust. In addition, Ming co-founded Design Brigade, a project to connect design students with community design problems, at Yale’s Center for Collaborative Arts and Media.
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Zenovia has been working on the S/AX and is now co-chair. In the past the committee has done portfolio reviews and one-on-one meetings with students (when in person). Recently the committee conducted a panel on the challenges and opportunities of entering the post-GSD life.
Through courses at Dartmouth, Zenovia has been working with students on developing projects that explore the social impact of Architecture in Public Space, emphasizing ideas that can accommodate the needs and desires of vulnerable individuals and underserved communities. She provides one-on-one mentorship to all her students and other students, many of whom (based on race, gender, nationality). She has been organizing panels and events which explore professional matters emerged by the needs of students, often focusing on social impact, ethics in design, and ethics in professional practice.
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Biography coming soon…
Sameh is one of the co-creators of Design Impact and has contributed substantively to several DI, including “Following the Sun: Design Futures at the Intersection of Health, Equity and Climate Change.” He is an active contributor to the Ambassadorship Committee and was selected to co-chair the Governance Committee this year to help strengthen the international dimension of the
Sameh’s training in architecture, urban design, and urban planning, plus finance and economics, makes him well positioned to serve as a bridge between different design disciplines in the GSD. In his work at the World Bank, he served as global director for urban, resilience and land, in which he oversaw a global investment program of $30 billion. He has just transitioned as director for sustainable development in Europe and Central Asia, covering a range of issues including cities, post-conflict reconstruction, environment, water, and landscapes, among others.
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As a new member of the Alumni Council, Ole has joined the Design Impact Committee and he has also been accepted as a mentor in the GSD Mentorship Program.
Ole earned a bachelor’s degree at Manchester University in England before coming to the GSD for a Master of Architecture degree. He worked in Boston before moving to Edinburgh, where he worked for six years as an architect. He then co-founded NSW Arkitektur in Oslo and is currently Founding Partner and Architectural Director. The firm has three locations in Norway and has done a number of jobs abroad. Ole has served as President of the Norwegian Association of Architects and has also been active in the academic world, having been a teacher and external examiner in 7 architectural schools in 6 countries – currently in Riga, Latvia. He is also the village architect in the Mediaeval village Colletta di Castelbianco in Italy.
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Kristina is the co-chair of the Ambassadorship Committee, Communications Committee, and has actively participated in the Executive Committee. Her efforts have centered on creating enriching and relevant experiences for alumni and current students to support the GSD in creating a vibrant community. She has served on several panels of the GSD Design Impact Series as well as Student Alumni Exchange events.
Kristina has actively participated in the creation of the value statements of the GSD Alumni Council. She served as one of the founders of the GSD Alumni Award programming and has served as most recent co-chair of the committee to select the illustrious awardees. She serves on several association and professional boards in her state of New Mexico and nationally.
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Shi has served on the Alumni Council since 2021. She is a member of the Student Alumni Exchange Committee and Mentorship Subcommittee and has actively served on regional Student Alumni events to promote the engagement of the alumni community.
Shi Zhou, AIA, RIBA, LEED AP BD+C is the founding Principal of Studio 10, a multidisciplinary architectural design studio based in Shenzhen/Hong Kong, China. In her practice, Shi views Architecture not only as a media that shelters us from and through which we sense the surrounding environment, but also the catalyst that sparks the economic and cultural revitalization of the urban and rural communities, a generator and vessel for sociological, cultural reflection and advancement, without compromising its harmonious relationship with nature. In 2021, Studio 10 was selected by Architizer as one of the 10 Female-Led Firms at the Forefront of Architecture.
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