News

December 16, 2020 – GGN is pleased to announce the promotions of Chihiro Shinohara Donovan to Senior Associate, Azzurra Cox to Associate, Rikerrious Geter to Associate, and Wolfgang Umana to Office Manager.

Chihiro Shinohara Donovan's design enthusiasm is for exploring elegant, functional solutions for complex urban sites, reflecting her background in architecture, landscape architecture and environmental design. She has worked on the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, DC, Dongtan Park in Seoul, South Korea, and Spring District Parks in Bellevue, WA. Currently, Chihiro is the Project Designer on India Basin Shoreline Park in San Francisco, CA.

Azzurra Cox comes to landscape architecture by way of her love of cities and her commitment to public space. An interest in social theory and the humanities informs her approach to the discipline, and in the power of landscape to shape and reflect collective social narratives. Azzurra is on the design team and leading the public engagement for the India Basin Shoreline Park project in San Francisco, CA. In addition to practice, she serves as Urban Design Commissioner on the Seattle Design Commission, reviewing all city capital improvement projects, and served one term on the inaugural Central Area Design Review Board.

Rikerrious Geter examines and promotes how public space can best serve impoverished areas to encourage equitable, healthy and sustainable communities. He recently participated in engaging the Bayview Hunters Point neighborhood of San Francisco to help them visualize their India Basin Shoreline Park. His current projects include West Main in Bellevue, WA and Mercer Blocks in Seattle, WA where he brings an emphasis to sustainability. In addition to practice, Rikerrious serves on the Washington Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects (WASLA) – Student and Emerging Professional Committee, and formerly on the Seattle Design Commission as a voting commissioner for all city capital improvement projects.

Wolfgang Umana's experience in social media, communications, outreach, and technical services provides a valuable resource to GGN. He recently transformed the Washington, DC Office space to accommodate a growing number of designers and continually advances GGN’s technology infrastructure with cutting-edge hardware and software. By beta testing and integrating the latest advancements in IT, Wolfgang explores the best ways to increase efficiency and efficacy wherever possible. In his role as the DC Office Manager, his familiarity with the DC metropolitan area makes him a knowledgeable and familiar face.

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November 20, 2020 - GGN will be working with the Sydney Modern Project architect, SANAA, and landscape architect, McGregor Coxall, on the expansion project known as the Sydney Modern Project, which aims to double the existing exhibition space and create seamless connections between indoor and outdoor spaces.

The new building is designed by Pritzker Prize-winning Tokyo-based architects Kazuyo Sejima + Ryue Nishizawa/ SANAA, with Architectus serving as executive architect.

“It’s an honor to work on the Sydney Modern Project – the expansion of one of Australia’s and Sydney’s most prominent art destinations,” said Kathryn Gustafson. “Public open spaces are, by definition inclusive and diverse and it’s exciting to create welcoming and unique experiences for all visitors to connect with the environment both natural and cultural.”

The landscape design will create a unified art museum campus connecting the existing and newbuildings, unfolding as a sequence of experiences for visitors across open spaces and gardensthat are free and accessible to all, 24 hours a day.

The design complements the architecture of the Gallery’s new building as well as maximizing open space and public amenity. There will be 381 trees across the campus when the expansion is completed in 2022, an increase of more than 70% on the number of trees before construction.

Learn more in the Australian Publication: Architecture & Design.

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October 28, 2020 - Katherine Liss and Hannah Vondrak will speak at the Course Grain Beach Symposium via Zoom on November 13, 2020 from 3-5pm Pacific. Registration is free and open to all ages.

The Exploratorium in San Francisco and State Coastal Conservancy are hosting this virtual symposium on Coarse Grain Beaches as a natural intervention for shoreline resilience. Throughout the San Francisco Bay area, environmental planners, agencies, and local landowners are confronting the rapid change and erosion of the shoreline, a coastal hazard exacerbated by the effects of climate change including sea level rise and increased storms. One potential adaptation to help address the problem is the restoration of coarse grain (e.g., gravel and cobble) beaches that can act as ‘living shorelines’ and replace or be used in combination with traditional “hard” solutions such as riprap or stabilized levees. Beaches were historically present in San Francisco Bay and can offer a habitat for a variety of wildlife as well as shoreline protection that helps reduce wave energy and erosion.

The purpose of the symposium will be to discuss the emerging need for coarse beaches, the environmental and physical benefits that they have the potential to provide, and the challenges and opportunities associated with their design and implementation. Speakers include Brett Milligan, a professor of Landscape Architecture at UC Davis and founding member of Dredge Research Collaborative; Julie Beagle, a Senior Scientist at the San Francisco Estuary Institute; Tim Clark, a Senior Designer at SCAPE/Landscape Architecture; Eddie Divita, a civil engineer at Environmental Science Associates; Katherine Liss, an Associate at GGN; Hannah Vondrak, an Associate at GGN; and Blake Jopling is a Project Manager at Rana Creek.

Learn more and register at Eventbrite

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October 23, 2020 - Shannon Nichol gave the international keynote presentation “Local Ecology in Concept Design” at the 2020 Hengshui Lake Eco-Civilization International Conference held October 23 through 26 in Hengshui, Hubei Province, China. Shannon introduced GGN’s design philosophy and emphasized the importance of working with local communities and ecologies in projects throughout the design process. The presentation was pre-recorded and over 30,000 audiences tuned in, virtually as well as in person.

Image Credit: 2020 Hengshui Lake Eco-Civilization International Conference

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November 13, 2019 - GGN is participating in four education sessions at the 2019 ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture in San Diego, CA, November 15-18, 2019.

On Friday, Lauren Schmidt is presenting Zero to One: Open Your Practice to the World of BIM with Xue (Phyllis) Zhou of AECOM and Aiden Ackerman of the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry. This workshop is addressing the challenges and solutions landscape teams face when starting to use BIM. Lessons from project cases are being shared, with broad research of how numerous landscape firms are scaling up BIM use. Participants will get hands-on practice on modeling a sample landscape project and evaluating workflow among different software.

Also on Friday, David Malda is speaking on the topic of Drawing Matters: Exploring the Value of Drawing in Landscape Architecture with Michale Batts of STEWART and Kona Gray of EDSA. Rather than the familiar debate over digital versus hand graphics, this session considers the value of drawing as a process connected to seeing, thinking, and engaging throughout design.

On Saturday, Kathryn Gustafson is speaking to Finding Design: Case Studies in the Creative Process with Walter Hood of Hood Design Studio and Susan Cohen. This session reviews ways in which an active imagination and a creative spirit fuels the design process in landscape architecture.

On Sunday, Kara Weaver is speaking about Integrating Security into Site Design: Evolving Strategies for Protecting Public Spaces with Margaret Plumb of Design Workshop and Len Hopper of Weintraub Diaz Landscape Architecture. This session examines how landscape architects are protecting urban public spaces by integrating innovative security features into a site while creating vibrant public spaces.

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