Women in Landscape Architecture

Women in Landscape Architecture Profiles, Part 1

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images courtesy of: Alexandra Mei, ASLA; Sandy Meulners, ASLA, and Mend Collaborative working with the City of El Paso CID; SuLin Kotowicz, FASLA, and VIRIDIS Design Group; Angelica Rockquemore, ASLA, and Erin Emerson

ASLA kicked off Women’s History Month with a post from Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) leader Lara Moffat, ASLA, on recent WILA highlights and what’s ahead for the PPN. The following week, ASLA’s Gender Equity Task Force hosted the first webinar in their speaker series, which is now available to watch on-demand: Closing the Gender Equity Gap, Advocacy in the Workplace. Check out the presentations from Jeanne Lukenda, ASLA, David Sanchez-Aguilera, Sami Sikanas, ASLA, and Ujijji Davis on how to be an advocate for yourself and for larger, impactful changes to office culture and employee benefits. Hear firsthand experiences from practitioners who are making changes in their companies through employee-driven initiatives and setting off on their own.

All throughout the month, ASLA is also celebrating #womeninlandscapearchitecture who are shaping our environment on social media, starting with ASLA leadership: three women are serving as President (Emily O’Mahoney, FASLA), Immediate Past President (Eugenia Martin, FASLA), and President-Elect (SuLin Kotowicz, FASLA). If you missed the historic moment at the ASLA 2022 Conference on Landscape Architecture when this trio came together, a video was made to mark this occasion, featuring Eugenia Martin, FASLA, interviewing five of her predecessors as ASLA President and her two successors about their experiences and expectations leading ASLA.

In case you’re taking a break from social media, or just happened to have missed a few of these WILA profiles, we are recapping them here on The Field. This post includes Alexandra Mei, ASLA, Angelica Rockquemore, ASLA, Sandy Meulners, ASLA, and SuLin Kotowicz, FASLA. Stay tuned for a second set of profiles next week!

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Women’s History Month: Building on the Past, Planning for the Future

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by Lara Moffat, ASLA

WILA PPN leaders and representatives from ASLA’s Gender Equity Task Force at the ASLA 2022 Conference on Landscape Architecture. Left to right: Lara Moffat, ASLA, Kristina Snyder, ASLA, Emily O’Mahoney, FASLA, Joy Kuebler, ASLA, Ebru Ozer, ASLA, Wendy Miller, FASLA, Laurie Hall, ASLA, Su Wanqin, ASLA. / image: courtesy of Lara Moffat

As we kick off Women’s History Month, the Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) is pleased to share what we have been up to, which is building on the past and planning for the future! We will continue the conversations from our participation at the ASLA 2022 Conference on Landscape Architecture and bring those into focus with a theme in 2023 of health: mental, physical, and social.

Our first event for the year occurred last month with a virtual open forum where we recapped the highlights from San Francisco: we shared takeaways from the Deep Dive on Cultivating Conversations: An Open Dialogue to Effect Change in Organizational Culture; reviewed the discussion with the ASLA’s Gender Equity Task Force during our WILA PPN Campfire Session; and outlined our initiatives for 2023.

A Look Back at San Francisco

On Saturday of the conference, we were fortunate to have had a Deep Dive presentation selected on Cultivating Conversations: An Open Dialogue to Effect Change in Organizational Culture. Resulting from the 2021 WILA PPN Campfire Session, From Mentorship to Sponsorship: Friendship is the Key!, exploring how professional relationships contribute to a flourishing career, we developed this session based on the findings and requests of the 55 attendees.

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The Women in Landscape Architecture Walk is Coming to San Francisco

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San Francisco’s Rincon Park is a stop on the Women in Landscape Architecture Walk on November 14. / image: Wendy Mok, ASLA

Getting excited for the ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture yet? The Field is highlighting a sampling of conference events over the next two weeks to help you plan your schedule.

After a few days of education sessions, deep dives, exploring the EXPO, and PPN events in Practice Basecamp, you may be ready for some fresh air. The Women in Landscape Architecture Walk will be just the thing you need to jumpstart the final day of the conference, taking place bright and early Monday morning on November 14.

Continuing a tradition that began at the 2009 ASLA conference in Chicago when Angela Dye, FASLA, was ASLA President, this year the ASLA Northern California Chapter’s WILA Walk will explore the SOMA district, including the East Cut neighborhood, San Francisco’s new Downtown, and Yerba Buena District, the original cultural and civic institutional hub at SOMA. We will see and discuss an energetic mix of sleek residential and commercial high rises, repurposed live-work historic buildings, small businesses, corporate headquarters, new streetscapes, and public green spaces as well as a revitalization plan for the original cultural hub.

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Celebrating Women in Landscape Architecture

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The 2021 Women in Landscape Architecture Walk in Nashville’s Frankie Pierce Park / image: courtesy of Laura Schroeder, ASLA / @lauraschroederphotography.com

On this International Women’s Day, ASLA’s Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) is excited to see landscape architects in the spotlight and taking the lead in a variety of ways, from ASLA National—with President Eugenia Martin, FASLA, President-Elect Emily O’Mahoney, FASLA, and President-Elect candidates SuLin Kotowicz, FASLA, and Pam Linn, FASLA—to 2019 ASLA conference keynote speaker Kotchakorn Voraakhom, ASLA, being interviewed by The New York Times as part of their Women and Leadership special report.

In the midst of Women’s History Month, we are taking a look back at 2021 WILA highlights, along with initiatives currently underway, including a partnership with WxLA and the new Women of Color Licensure Advancement Program.

Last November at the ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture in Nashville, Women in Landscape Architecture PPN Co-Chairs Lara Moffat, ASLA, and Sahar Teymouri, ASLA, led a session on “From Mentorship to Sponsorship: Friendship is the Key!” exploring how professional relationships contribute to a flourishing career.

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Learning the Business of Design

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by Sahar Teymouri, ASLA, and Patricia Matamoros Araujo, Assoc. ASLA

Do you have questions about how a landscape architecture design on paper gets implemented in the real world, and don’t know the answers as a student? Or do you wonder about the practical details of the work you are supposed to do in the future? Maybe you’re a recent graduate just entering the profession, or an emerging or mid-career professional wanting to take the next step on your career path and learn about other aspects of landscape architecture in addition to design.

ASLA’s virtual SKILL | ED program took place across three afternoons last month, with a wide range of sessions addressing many of these questions. Registration to access recorded sessions on-demand is open through this Friday, July 16, and you can watch the sessions until August 31.

First, you’ll learn how to create a killer LinkedIn profile to showcase your skills, pursue the role you’re aiming for, and craft your career path. Next, you will learn how well-known, award-winning landscape architecture firms handle their business development and their strategies to stand out among their competitors. Finally, if you want to manage the business side of design, you will gain some critical insights.

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Elevating Women in a Male-Dominated Industry in 2021

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by Mary Martinich, ASLA, PLA, CDT

image: SeamonWhiteside

Occupational sectors, such as landscape architecture, have been slow to close the gender gap. An estimated 24 percent of project landscape architects are women at present, but the number is steadily increasing—especially after a year that has forced all industries to rethink and reprioritize diversity.

The landscape architecture industry is now at the forefront of adapting and evolving with a renewed passion for building a more diverse workforce that is competitive and economically successful.

I am sharing some of the trends and obstacles guiding this transformation that I am encountering as Charleston Team Leader and Women’s Leadership Initiative Leader of SeamonWhiteside, a landscape architecture and civil engineering firm with offices throughout the Carolinas. The firm has focused its efforts on addressing the needed workforce diversity across the industry based on these trends.

Trend: The Glass Ceiling is Cracking

Females now hold more leadership roles in the industry than before, but few have positions at the highest level. While the change needed is recognized, a prevalent shift will eventually occur as company leadership understands that with diversity comes more talent and more business.

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Gender Equity in Landscape Architecture: Survey Results Summary

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by Sahar Teymouri, ASLA

Landscape architecture emerging professionals
The Emerging Professionals Reception at the 2019 ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture. / image: EPNAC

Women’s History Month is a great time to reflect on a survey conducted last year as part of the WxLA proposal for “Female Forward: Three Generations of Womxn Leaders Talk Life, Work, and Legacy,” by Andrea Cochran, FASLA, Cinda Gilliland, ASLA, Emily Greenwood, Rebecca Leonard, and myself for the 2020 ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture. The data presented in this post comes from that survey, distributed last year with support from WxLA and ASLA. The survey’s aim was to collect information on emerging professionals’—those just entering the field—experiences, challenges, and opportunities in landscape architecture.

Survey Characteristics and Participant Demographics

The survey was open for 45 days, beginning on July 1, 2020. We asked respondents 21 questions in three categories:

  • Demographic Information (9 questions),
  • Workplace Culture (6 questions), and
  • Career Advancement & Self Development (6 questions).

The survey was completed by 71% of the 159 participants.

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Resources for Building Equity in the Workplace

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by the WILA PPN Leadership Team

image: You X Ventures on Unsplash

This article is part of a guide the Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) Leadership Team is releasing this month titled How To Reach Gender Equity in Your Workplace: A Guide for Landscape Architects. For more information about the guide and why we developed it, check out our first article, Introducing the WILA PPN’s Gender Equity Guide: A Toolkit for Landscape Architects.

The American Society of Landscape Architects’ Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) Leadership Team, led by PPN Co-Chair TJ Marston, has curated a list of resources to help businesses and individuals tackle four important workplace issues that affect gender equity in landscape architecture: flexibility, caregiving, pay inequity, and discrimination:

Startup Pregnant is a five star-rated podcast about reinventing work and parenthood, looking at deep human questions around what it means to become a parent, grow a business, deal with success, and learn from failure.

  • Why we love it: You don’t have to run a start-up or be pregnant to find this podcast helpful. Regular listeners will find the stories from entrepreneurial women and leaders cut to the core of issues facing parents and women in today’s workforce.
  • Fun fact: The founder, Sarah Peck, is a former landscape designer who received her MLA from the University of Pennsylvania. While she keeps the focus on her new business ventures, she knows our industry and the demands it takes. Plus, she has a great radio voice that you’ll find easy to listen to on your commute or in your free time!

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Tools to Tackle Gender Inequity in the Workplace

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by TJ Marston, ASLA, and the WILA PPN Leadership Team

2017 Women in Landscape Architecture Walk attendees in Los Angeles’ Grand Park. / image: EPNAC

This article is part of a guide the Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) Leadership Team is releasing this month titled How To Reach Gender Equity in Your Workplace: A Guide for Landscape Architects. For more information about the guide and why we developed it, check out our first article, Introducing the WILA PPN’s Gender Equity Guide: A Toolkit for Landscape Architects.

What can you DO to support women in the workplace?

The American Society of Landscape Architects’ Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) Leadership Team, led by PPN Co-Chair TJ Marston, has curated a list of tools and tips to help businesses and individuals tackle four important workplace issues that affect gender equity in landscape architecture: flexibility, caregiving, pay inequity, and discrimination.

Tools:

  • EDGE Certification is the leading global assessment methodology and business certification standard for gender equality. The methodology was designed for medium to large organizations with a minimum of 200 employees, but they do accept inquiries from smaller companies.
  • The JUST program is a voluntary disclosure tool which helps organizations optimize policies that improve social equity and enhance employee engagement. Organizations can use the label on their website or marketing to demonstrate their commitments to these issues. While larger firms like Mithun and Sasaki have used this program with great success, the JUST program also has a sliding scale for pricing based on the size of your business. Anyone can do it, no matter the size!

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Introducing the Women in Landscape Architecture PPN’s Gender Equity Guide

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by TJ Marston, ASLA

The 2019 Women in Landscape Architecture Walk in San Diego, during the ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture. / images: ASLA

The Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network’s Gender Equity Guide: A Toolkit for Landscape Architects

Would you like to improve gender equity in your workplace?

The American Society of Landscape Architects’ Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) leadership team has crafted a series of posts that will appear here on The Field over the course of March, Women’s History Month, providing tools, tips, and resources for firms and individuals looking to tackle gender inequity in their workplace.

This information will then be compiled as a downloadable PDF, available on the WILA PPN’s Resources page.

Why is the WILA PPN leadership team providing this guide?

While women are entering our field at unprecedented rates, articles like “The Big Time. The Bigger Time.” in Landscape Architecture Magazine last April showed us that we still have work to do to support the advancement of women in our profession.

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Two Women [Re]Making Wikipedia History

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by TJ Marston, ASLA

image: Alexandra Mei

Starting this Sunday, December 8, the The Wikipedia Project is taking over the WxLA Instagram!

The Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WiLA PPN)’s new Wiki Officer, Alexandra Mei, Associate ASLA, and her research partner Shira Grosman, Student ASLA, created The Wikipedia Project to share their work promoting the history of women in landscape architecture in Wikipedia.

“As a shared and open resource, Wikipedia provides a public platform for us to acknowledge and celebrate the groundbreaking work that women have contributed to the field.”
– Alexandra Mei, WiLA Wiki Officer

The takeover will last one week, December 8 – December 14, so make sure you follow @w_x_la to catch it all!

Wiki Writers:

Alexandra Mei, Associate ASLA, is a landscape designer at Merritt Chase and a lecturer at Washington University in St. Louis. She recently completed a two-year research fellowship from the Harvard University Graduate School of Design, focused on the patterns of weathering and decay in the design of public landscapes. Alexandra graduated from WashU with a bachelor’s degree in architecture and from Harvard GSD with her masters in landscape architecture. She grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area and now lives in St. Louis.

Shira Grosman, Student ASLA, is a Masters Candidate in Landscape Architecture at Harvard GSD. She has worked in landscape architecture and architecture firms in New York and Los Angeles and conducted multiple research projects on women in design. She is currently co-editor of Womxn in Design‘s Bibliography on Identity Theories. Shira graduated from WashU with a bachelor’s degree in architecture and currently lives in Cambridge, MA.

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How GROW is Changing BrightView, One Woman at a Time

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by Kate Douglas Kestyn, Affiliate ASLA

A recent regional conference called GROW Live!
A recent regional conference called GROW Live! in Blue Bell, PA / image: Kate Douglas Kestyn

The American Society of Landscape Architects was founded by 11 people. Do you know how many were women? One.

Beatrix Farrand studied the art and science of landscape before any formal academic programs existed. In the late 1800s women were excluded from public projects, but that didn’t stop Beatrix from gaining prominence. She began her career designing private residential gardens, but her later work is likely better known to you. It includes the National Cathedral, White House gardens, Princeton, and Yale.

She was the first. Since then, woman have come to serve a broad range of roles in the landscape industry. But we are still outnumbered by men. That’s why BrightView—the nation’s largest landscape company—founded GROW (Growth in Relationships + Opportunities for Women), the company’s first Employee Resource Group (ERG), with the goal to attract, retain, and promote women in the company.

Caring for our people is part of BrightView’s culture. The new corporate reality since BrightView went public is that shareholders have certain expectations and cultivating diversity is among them. “Being the largest landscape company in the country carries certain obligations as a leader in the industry,” said CEO Andrew Masterman. “The GROW initiative is just one way we can achieve that.” He added, “the women of BrightView are making history, changing the way landscaping is delivered, and leading the design, development, maintenance, and enhancements of some of the country’s most recognizable environments.”

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Being the Change

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by Gina Ford, FASLA, Cinda Gilliland, ASLA, Rebecca Leonard, Jamie Maslyn Larson, ASLA, and Steven Spears, FASLA

Gina Ford, FASLA, presenting during the 2018 ASLA annual meeting
Gina Ford, FASLA, presenting during the 2018 ASLA Annual Meeting / image: EPNAC

Regardless of your political perspective, we can all agree that 2016 was an interesting year for our nation. Since, we have seen women, in particular, participating in civic action and protest in record numbers. Accordingly, last fall, the midterm election of 2018 resulted in a wave of “firsts”—with a history-making number of women, people of color, LBGTQ leaders, and women of color breaking onto the national scene in politics not just as candidates, but being voted in as representatives of their constituents.

A similar shift is happening in the practice of landscape architecture. In the years of 2016 and 2017, we—Gina Ford, Cinda Gilliland, Rebecca Leonard, and Jamie Maslyn Larson—all highly recognized, talented female landscape architects and planners—broke away from our signature roles in traditional national award-winning firms—Sasaki, SWA, Design Workshop, and West 8, respectively—to lead or start new practices, some after decades of practice in those offices. In October of 2018, concurrent with our panel discussion on the challenges and opportunities of female leadership at the national ASLA conference, moderated by Steven Spears, we published the Women’s Landscape Equality (re)Solution online at www.change.org, outlining actions for leveling the playing field for women in our profession.

The Resolution provides some context about the state of the profession as it relates to gender equality, a charge for change and a specific set of commitments to be made by signatories. We are asking supporters of it and its recommended commitments for the following:

  • Sign the (re)Solution.
  • Share your commitment to the (re)Solution by posting it on your firm’s website and on social media with the hashtag #landscapeequalitysolution and other relevant hashtags;
  • Review your firm’s policies and salaries for opportunities to make positive change right away; and
  • Engage in conversations with your colleagues on how to more actively enlist women and minorities into your firm’s work, culture and leadership.

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Women in Landscape Architecture (WILA) Annual Meeting Recap

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by Alison Kennedy, ASLA

The Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) Meeting in Philadelphia / image: EPNAC

The 2018 ASLA Annual Meeting and EXPO was a landmark meeting for the Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN). Not only did our PPN host two well-attended events as part of the conference, we were also pleased to see women in our profession more equally represented amongst education session panels. 20 WILA PPN members spoke, moderated sessions, and led field sessions on a wide variety of topics over the course of the meeting.

The PPN’s Women in Leadership Roundtable took place on the PPN Live stage in the EXPO hall on Saturday morning. With more than 90 attendees in the standing-room-only audience, we can safely say that this is one of the best, if not the best, turnouts we have ever had at our PPN Live meeting. Roundtable participants Wendy Miller, FASLA, Vanessa Warren, ASLA, Haley Blakeman, ASLA, and Magdalena Aravena, ASLA, shared their paths to leadership positions and lessons learned along the way.

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Mentorship Programs for Landscape Architects

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by Alison Kennedy, ASLA

A coffee break in Grand Park during the 2017 Women in Landscape Architecture Walk in Los Angeles / image: EPNAC

ASLA’s Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) has heard that many of our members are interested in a mentorship program. We are in the process of pulling together resources to help you find a program you can join, or give you inspiration to start your own program.

Here are few we’ve put together or located so far:

Mentorship Resources:
Women in Design: How to Find a Network of Other Women Designers
Lessons Learned from Mentors
Guidance on Networking & Mentoring for Emerging Professionals
Landscape Architecture Mentoring Programs (2011 report)
Wanted: Examples of Landscape Architecture Mentor Programs

ASLA Chapter Mentorship Programs:
Colorado
Iowa
Minnesota
Northern California
Potomac

Does Your Chapter Support or Work with a Local Mentorship Program?

If you don’t see your chapter’s local mentorship program listed above, please send the link to propractice@asla.org so we can add it to our list. And if you, or someone from your chapter, is interested in writing a short description of the program, please let us know. We’d love to hear from members across the country, especially from areas where landscape architects may be few and far between, and finding a mentor may be more of a challenge. Share your landscape architecture mentorship story!

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Women in Design: How to Find a Network of Other Women Designers

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by Christa Schaefer, ASLA, and Tanya Olson, ASLA

Scenes from the Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network‘s annual gathering / image: EPNAC

You’ve reached that point in your professional life where you find yourself looking for people to connect professionally and create networks with. These special individuals provide a unique dynamic to the depth of our professional lives and may be peers or mentors. They make us feel self-assured and connected, and sometimes become great friends or even business partners. They can be male or female, but there are benefits to finding connection with others of the same sex. Here are two stories from the Women in Landscape Architecture (WILA) leadership team on how they found a network of Women in Design (WID).

WID-Wisconsin – Christa Schaefer, ASLA

I finished my MLA in the Twin Cities and moved back home to Waukesha, WI for job opportunities and to stay connected with family. When I moved I found myself leaving my professional connections behind and felt disconnected from landscape architects in my new home. I wondered who and where they were.

Job opportunities helped me develop a few professional connections, but few were with other women in design fields. I reached out and became engaged with the Wisconsin Chapter of ASLA (WI-ASLA), but still found minimal female connections. Ultimately those opportunities through WI-ASLA expanded my leadership skills and I did finally make some very valuable female connections. These connections have helped support me finding my way through the very male-dominated world I currently work in.

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The Los Angeles Women in Landscape Architecture Walk

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image: Emily O’Mahoney, FASLA

Four Los Angeles landscape architecture projects were highlighted during the 2017 ASLA Annual Meeting’s Women in Landscape Architecture Walk, organized by Stephanie Psomas, ASLA, of Pamela Burton & Company, and the local host chapter, ASLA SoCal. Nearly 80 participants braved the early start time on the final day of the meeting and were rewarded with the rare treat of watching light break over the historic and modern cityscape of downtown Los Angeles.

1: Biddy Mason Park

The crowd of began gathering at the centrally located Biddy Mason Park. This L-shaped pocket park is distinctly urban and makes up the interior space of nearly an entire city block. Despite being immediately adjacent to the popular local and tourist stop of Grand Central Market, the park entrance is subtly marked and the space is quiet.

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Demographics Survey: Last Call for Responses

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image: iStock © petervician

The Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) has been conducting a survey for the past several months about demographics. Please help and take the survey if you have not done so already. It is easy and quick.

Where we are:

  • We are at 3% (of ASLA membership) with 483 responses (as of June 13, 2017).
  • We have a ratio of 25% men and 75% women among the respondents.

Where we want to be:

  • We would like 5-10% of membership to complete the survey, which is 750 to 1,500 respondents.
  • We want a ratio matching our membership, which is closer to 62% men and 35% women (2.3% undisclosed). Men needed!

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Women in Landscape Architecture Leaders

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Clockwise from top left: The ASLA Annual Meeting’s Women in Landscape Architecture Walk in Chicago (2015), New Orleans (2016), and Denver (2014) / image: Event Photography of North America Corporation (EPNAC)

Meet the ASLA Women in Landscape Architecture PPN Leadership Team!

The Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) leadership team meets monthly, focusing on the experience and contributions of women in the profession, creating resources for women in the profession, providing mentorship opportunities, encouraging discussion of work/life balance concerns within our profession, and establishing a virtual home for members. We consider ways for our membership to become more active advocates for landscape architecture and women practitioners, including writing post for The Field, coordinating the Women in Landscape Architecture Walk at the ASLA Annual Meeting, and currently conducting a survey to get a more in-depth understanding of the demographics of caretaking and leave issues for landscape architects.

In addition to a chair or co-chairs, many PPNs also have larger leadership teams that include past chairs and PPN officers focusing on various PPN activities. In this post, we’d like to introduce our co-chairs and officers through their answers to the following questions:

  • Why are you active in ASLA?
  • Why are you a part of the Women in Landscape Architecture PPN?
  • What is your favorite landscape?

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Highlighting the Work of Women-Led Firms

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Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Campus, Seattle, WA, Gustafson Guthrie Nichol, 2014 Professional ASLA Award of Excellence, General Design Category image: Sean Airhart
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Campus, Seattle, WA, Gustafson Guthrie Nichol, 2014 Professional ASLA Award of Excellence, General Design Category
image: Sean Airhart

Call for Landscape Architecture Firm Award Nominations

The call for nominations is open for the 2017 ASLA Honors. These prestigious awards recognize individuals and organizations for their lifetime achievements and notable contributions to the profession of landscape architecture.

One of the ASLA Honors is the Landscape Architecture Firm Award, the highest honor that the American Society of Landscape Architects may bestow on a landscape architecture firm. ASLA would like to increase the number of nominations received for firms with female founders and principals.

Nominations may be made by an ASLA professional member or an ASLA chapter. Many nominations are submitted by the firm’s principal. Please consider having your firm nominated. The deadline for all nominations is Friday, January 20, 2017.

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Why Are Women Leaving (Landscape) Architecture?

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The 2016 WILA Walk in New Orleans during the ASLA Annual Meeting and EXPO last month image: Event Photography of North America Corporation (EPNAC)
The 2016 WILA Walk in New Orleans during the ASLA Annual Meeting and EXPO last month
image: Event Photography of North America Corporation (EPNAC)

A response to the article ‘Why Are Women Leaving Architecture?‘ by Beth R. Mosenthal, AIA, LEED AP BD+C
Courtesy Building Dialogue, June 2016

The Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) leadership team thought that this article holds relevance to our field in landscape architecture. Is there gender equity in landscape architecture? I believe that it is much the same as in architecture, though their numbers appear to be more drastic than ours. Take a look at the article, Why Are Women Leaving Architecture?, from the June 2016 issue of Building Dialogue, and know the following stats for landscape architecture:

We continue to try and understand what happens to women in the workplace and the different career paths (or mommy paths) that are taken. What is the percentage of women who own companies or are principals in firms? Our (WILA) gut feeling is that numbers such as these would be low. How many women leave the workforce and never re-enter? And if they re-enter, what is their career path? How do we even track that? We should gather trends from the extensive work of AIA in their Equity by Design initiative and Diversity in the Profession of Architecture Report, and learn from our sister organization.

The WILA PPN has developed a survey that we would like you to take, both men and women—we would like your help in collecting information on the demographics of the field of landscape architecture. Please take 10 minutes to participate in our survey:

WILA PPN Survey

We aim to collect several hundred responses from both MEN and WOMEN all over the country to be statistically representative of the field. We anticipate this survey to be the start a more in depth study of the field akin to the recent study in the field of architecture called The Missing 32%. Folks often assume that landscape architecture fares similarly to architecture or other allied fields in terms of demographics; a study like this will help discover if that is in fact the case.

We hope to have preliminary data by World Landscape Architecture Month 2017. Once complete, an infographic summarizing the information will be developed and shared.

by Emily O’Mahoney, ASLA, WILA PPN Officer and Past Chair, and the WILA PPN Leadership Team

WILA at the Annual Meeting

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The 2015 WILA Walk in Chicago image: Event Photography of North America Corporation (EPNAC)
The 2015 WILA Walk in Chicago
image: Event Photography of North America Corporation (EPNAC)

The ASLA Annual Meeting and EXPO in New Orleans is just around the corner, and we can’t wait to see you there!

Women in Landscape Architecture (WILA) events for this year’s meeting include a discussion during our WILA Professional Practice Network (PPN) Meeting about Working Families and Navigating Work Relationships on Behalf of Your Family. Join us on Sunday, October 23 at 9:15 AM in the Garden District Meeting Room on the EXPO floor. Find us again at the EXPO Reception featuring the PPNs at 4:30 PM Sunday afternoon.

Once again, we are delighted to join the host chapter, ASLA Louisiana, for the Women in Landscape Architecture Walk on Monday morning, 7:00 – 8:30 AM. This is a FREE walking tour led by local landscape architects from the host chapter. Join ASLA Louisiana for a walk along the Mississippi River to visit existing and proposed riverfront projects designed to bring the City of New Orleans back to the River. Walk co-leaders Dana Brown and Gaylan Williams will lead us from the Convention Center to the Riverwalk, through Spanish Plaza and the future Four Seasons Hotel, through the Audubon Aquarium’s riverfront plaza, to Woldenberg Park and on to the cruise ship dock and the Mookwalk in front of the French Quarter. A new Riverfront Master Plan is underway to make walking more seamless, integrated and compelling. Spanish Plaza, a gift to the City in 1976 from Spain, is being re-imagined to commemorate the 300th birthday of the City of New Orleans in 2018.

Many education sessions this year explore topics relevant in particular to women in landscape architecture. WILA PPN Co-Chair Tanya Olson will be introducing one of these sessions: SAT-A10: Women in Landscape Architecture: Pathways to Success, on Saturday morning. More information on these events and education sessions which might be of interest to WILA members are listed below.

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Smart City, Safe City

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image: David Wogan via Flickr
image: David Wogan via Flickr

Cities across the world share one similar struggle: keeping citizens safe. Each city has unique and complex challenges; however, above all, the health, safety, and welfare of a city’s citizens is a top priority. The Smart City movement has gained momentum over the past decade as cities have begun to develop place-based strategies using information and communication technologies and the Internet to solve their specific problems. The beauty of these technologies is that they are accessible and dynamic. Smart cities can develop not only through government agencies, but also grassroots campaigns and private enterprises. It takes a village, as they say, to build a smart city.

Smart cities are able to adapt to their changing needs by incorporating real-time data and citizen feedback. The smart city becomes a sort of artificial intelligence—responding to its environment and making decisions based on input. This new type of city has the ability to help keep us safe by managing resources, preventing crime, enhancing public services, and simply helping us find our way. As a designer, this is a fascinating realm for me. As a woman, even more so. What would make me feel safer in my city? How can we use these technologies to design better public spaces that feel safer (and are safer) for women?

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WILA Interview Series: Advice

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image: iStock © PeopleImages
image: iStock © PeopleImages

The Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN)’s focus for 2015-2016 is an interview series developed around being women landscape architects, life/work balance, and mentors. The WILA PPN’s co-chairs and officers developed a set of 17 questions, then sought out willing landscape architects and began the interview process. The following is an in-depth look at responses to the last group of interview questions, asking what general advice they have for new landscape architects and what specific suggestions they would have for their 25-year-old self.

The result: be focused, be fearless, be engaged, be connected. It will work out; build the relationships and put as much into those professional relationships as into the practice of the profession. We are not alone in our workplaces. Use those around you to help define and determine where you want to be and work to get there. Good advice for anyone.

Many of our respondents suggested that new landscape architects be active and decisive in pursuing interests related to work focus and content and to seek out mentors and be engaged in learning from them about specific needs and aspirations. While some suggested focusing on the aspects/areas of most interest in landscape architecture, others encourage a well-rounded, more broad-based approach to the field. Be sure to do your research before reaching out to respect the time of the mentors and get involved early in ASLA and other professional societies through writing or activities to build relationships and connections in your new career.

As advice to themselves at 25, most focused on a version of ‘Relax, it’s going to work out.’ Coming in second were variations on ‘Build your relationship network with as much focus as you put on work.’

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WILA Interview Series: Mentorship, Part 2

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image: iStock © Steve Debenport
image: iStock © Steve Debenport

The Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN)’s focus for 2015-2016 is an interview series developed around being women landscape architects, life/work balance, and mentors. The WILA PPN’s co-chairs and officers developed a set of 17 questions, then searched out willing landscape architects and began the interview process. The following is a continuation on the theme of mentorship and an in-depth look at the responses to two questions posed to our interviewees.

These questions continue the conversation about how mentors influence us professionally, specifically asking what the interviewees’ mentors provided them and how their mentor needs may or may have not changed throughout their careers. Generally, what one gets out of their mentor relationships is very personal and different for everyone, but everyone that mentioned having a mentor was definitely influenced by that individual. There was a general theme of seeing the respondents grow from being mentored to becoming a mentor over time.

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WILA Interview Series: Mentorship, Part 1

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image: iStock © frankwolffnl
image: iStock © frankwolffnl

“The Mind is Not a Vessel to be Filled, but a Fire to be Kindled”

The Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN)’s focus for 2015-2016 is an interview series developed around being women landscape architects, life/work balance, and mentors. The WILA PPN’s co-chairs and officers developed a set of 17 questions, then searched out willing landscape architects and began the interview process. The following is the first of two posts on the topic of mentorship.

Women & Mentors

Two of our WILA PPN interview questions focused on women’s experience with, and serving as, mentors throughout their careers. One common theme was that mentoring or being mentored is not a particularly formalized process in most firms. The resulting experiences with mentoring or being mentored were very broad, from understanding appropriate office attire, to the sharing of technical knowledge, to focusing on career advancement.

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WILA Interview Series: Career Changes

ASLA staff2 Comments
image: iStock © Sadeugra
image: iStock © Sadeugra

The Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN)’s focus for 2015 is an interview series developed around being women landscape architects, life/work balance, and mentors. The WILA PPN leadership team developed 17 interview questions, and then found willing landscape architects to participate in the interview process.

This group of questions asked the interviewees to share information about their former careers and/or job experiences prior to landscape architecture. As outlined in our first post of the interview series, most of our interviewees said they chose landscape architecture as a second or even third career. So what did they do before, and how did those experiences help lead them to landscape architecture? Did those experiences help prepare them for their new career?

What kind of other job(s), if any, did you have before/during/after your career as a landscape architect?

Sometimes our paths to success and happiness become more crooked than straight. However, as we’ve all learned, there is no shortcut to any place worth going. Life can take some pretty sharp turns, but if you’re willing to follow a new path, you may end up where you always wanted to be. I had a prior career in the television industry and whenever I meet another landscape architect they’re always interested to hear how I ended up in landscape architecture. It seems like most of the time, the other person’s path was just as crooked as mine was.

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WILA Interview Series: Life/Work Balance

ASLA staffLeave a comment
image: iStock © alexsokolov
image: iStock © alexsokolov

The Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN)’s focus for 2015 is an interview series developed around being women landscape architects, life/work balance, and mentors. The WILA PPN leadership team developed 17 interview questions, and then found willing landscape architects to participate in the interview process. The following is an in-depth look at responses to the fourth group of interview questions, focusing on how respondents felt their responsibilities outside of work governed their choices and how their work places reacted or set the stage for support.

Nearly everyone has responsibilities outside of work that stress our life/work balance. How have you dealt with the specific life/work tensions in your career?

Though none of the questions specifically asked for respondents’ responsibilities outside of work, i.e. children, spousal needs, extended family, etc., between one-third and half of respondents mention children in their answers. Most also referred to spouses, and one to the care of parents. There was clearly a variety of familial backgrounds, but some common threads.

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WILA Interview Series: Influences

ASLA staff1 Comment
image: Kristina Snyder
image: Kristina Snyder

The Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN)’s focus for 2015 is an interview series developed around being women landscape architects, life/work balance, and mentors. The WILA PPN leadership team developed 17 interview questions, and then found willing landscape architects to participate in the interview process. The following is an in-depth look at responses to the third group of interview questions, asking how respondents felt their gender influenced challenges in their work and/or informed their design work.

Many of our respondents indicated that they had experienced issues with being heard on the job (both at the construction site and in the conference room). Most respond to this challenge by making sure they had their own voice and standing up for their ideas. Several also indicated that they did not feel that gender played a role in their design work, attributing any influences in design (either approach or aesthetic) to personality instead. On the other hand, quite a few mentioned that a focus on collaboration and consensus building in their work was directly related to gender.

Each person’s experience is highly personal, but in sharing, discussing, and being open about our influences and experiences as a profession we become familiar with different ways of approaching similar situations in the future and ultimately push forward the best design for each project.

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WILA Interview Series: Facing Challenges

ASLA staff1 Comment
image: iStock © Thomas_EyeDesign
image: iStock © Thomas_EyeDesign

The Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN)’s focus for 2015 is an interview series developed around being women landscape architects, life/work balance, and mentors. The WILA PPN leadership team developed 17 interview questions, and then found willing landscape architects to participate in the interview process.

The following is an in-depth look at responses to our second group of questions, focused on the topic of challenges and how to overcome them. Several recurring themes appeared throughout the answers to the questions: What challenges have you faced during your career which you attribute as specifically related to being a woman? How have you dealt with those challenges?

The majority of the women who participated in our interviews have experienced interpersonal challenges dealing with men in the office and in the field (with contractors). These difficulties were not only a matter of having to prove credibility and earn respect, but having to do so in a culturally acceptable way.

Quotes from our interviewees:

  • “The biggest career challenges I’ve faced related to being a woman stem from opinions formed by specific cultural or generational contexts. Some people have different ideas about what women can or can’t do or what’s appropriate behavior or language.”
  • “I wasn’t graceful in how I dealt with many of those scenarios, but I dealt with them…by being vocal…speaking to those I thought could make a change and by trying to call it when I could.”
  • “I have had people assume that my male partners were my ‘bosses.’ I have also had some (male) contractors not taking me seriously, talking down to me, or disregarding me.”

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