Building Stories: Out in Landscape is the third installment to our Building Stories series. We have brought together LGBTQ+ individuals from the field of landscape architecture to discuss what diversity and acceptance in the workplace means to them. Through a moderated conversation by Build Out Alliance & ASLA-NY DEI Committee, the panel will discuss the unique challenges and opportunities they have faced being LGBTQ+ individuals, how they have seen the profession’s attitude evolve over time and how they live their lives with pride in the workplace.

Moderators

Adrian Smith, FASLA

Landscape Architect, NYC Parks

Adrian has lived and worked in New York City for over 30 years. After graduating from Penn State with a degree in Landscape Architecture, he developed his creative and technical skills working for several private firms, including Sawyer|Berson and EDAW|AECOM in New York, and Reed|Hilderbrand in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He has created landscapes and gardens for college campuses, museums and private residential clients across the US and for housing developments, resort towns, and college campuses in Egypt, Libya and Oman. He currently manages a team of over 20 landscape professionals at NYC Parks who design and build parks and playgrounds on Staten Island, including Freshkills Park; and in the neighborhoods along the waterfront in Brooklyn and Queens.

Melinda Koo

Architect, EDG

Melinda is a registered architect in New York, California, and South Korea. With more than 10 years of professional experience, she has worked on a wide range of projects from interior fit-outs to affordable housing, market-rate residential, commercial, and mixed-use high-rise projects. She is a project architect at EDG Architecture + Engineering, leading commercial fit-out projects focusing on the post-pandemic urban environment. She has a master’s degree from The Cooper Union in NYC, and she received her Master & Bachelor of Science degree in Architecture from Seoul National University in Seoul, Korea. As a first-generation Korean American immigrant woman in the LGBTQ community, Melinda believes sharing her experience of intersectionality can add visibility of diversity and create a safer environment inclusive for everyone. 

Panelists

Gonzalo Cruz, ASLA

Design Principal, AECOM

Gonzalo Cruz, ASLA is a Design Principal at AECOM, leading the firm’s Urbanism + Planning Practice across the Americas. His work incorporates traditional forms of practice as well as large-scale infrastructure as it is driven by public realm design. Gonzalo’s professional accomplishments are rooted in his interdisciplinary background. In recent years, he has been creating innovative work at the intersection of large-scale infrastructure and placemaking, including South Battery Park City Resilience Wagner Park and Pier A Plaza, Brooklyn Montgomery Coastal Resilience Open Space, and Hoboken Cove Waterfront Park. Gonzalo holds a Bachelor of Architecture from the City College of New York and a Master of Landscape Architecture from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design. 

Ricardo Hinkle

Deputy Director of Landscape Architecture, NYC Parks

Ricardo contributes to a team overseeing 30,000 acres of land across all boroughs of the city. Since 2002, he has served as President of DC 37, Local 375, Chapter 7, where he represents the 500 design, engineering, and technical professionals of NYC Park in the city’s largest public employee union. Ricardo received his Masters in Urban Design from City College and a Masters in Landscape Architecture from Harvard Graduate School of Design. He holds a BA in Design of the Environment and BS in Civil Engineering from University of Pennsylvania.

Steven Lee

Associate Principal, SWA/Balsley

Steven is a landscape architect and urban designer with a passion for crafting meaningful and engaging urban public spaces. At SWA/Balsley he leads complex public realm projects domestically and abroad. His current works include eight public open spaces at Innovation QNS in Astoria, a new waterfront park of the100-acre Bayfront Redevelopment in Jersey City, and public realm designs for Uptown ATX in Austin, and Schuylkill Yards in Philadelphia. Steven holds an undergraduate degree from Claremont McKenna College and a Master of Landscape Architecture and Master of City Planning from the University of California, Berkeley. He has served as a design critic or guest lecturer at numerous universities including UC Berkeley, NJIT, CUNY City College of Technology, North Carolina A&T, Penn State, Columbia University and Cornell University.

Katrina Majewski, PLA, ASLA

Founder & Principal, Prototype

Katrina is a licensed landscape architect in New York, New Jersey and California, and a past president of ASLA’s Northern California chapter. She has over a decade of experience working for multiple award-winning firms on both the east and west coast. She’s in her second year of running her own practice, Prototype Design Group, whose work focuses on designing thoughtful, purpose driven and ecologically appropriate landscapes. Katrina holds a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Planning and design from Rutgers University and a certification in Geographic Information Systems from City College of San Francisco. She lives with her wife, who is also a landscape architect, in a small coastal town in New Jersey. 

Sami Sikanas

Landscape Architect, MARVEL

Sami is a landscape architectural designer at MARVEL whose work is focused on the urban, public realm. Her recent projects include an accessible playground in Philadelphia, a waterfront promenade in Queens, and the public-facing “front yard” of an affordable housing development in the Bronx. Sami received her Bachelor of Arts in Environmental Studies and Master of Arts in Landscape Architecture from the University of Michigan. In 2019, Sami presented Queer Urbanism and Design: Past, Preset, Future at the ASLA national conference, along with colleagues Addison Vawters and Emilio Martinez-Poppe. She is also the founder of the Queer Landscapes project, which was awarded a grant from the New York State Council on the Arts and the Architecture League of New York in 2021.