Speakers

Lisa Switkin, FAAR, ASLA
Senior Principal, James Corner Field Operations


Lisa SwitkinLisa Switkin is a Senior Principal at James Corner Field Operations, a leading-edge landscape architecture and urban design practice based in New York City. The practice is renowned for bold, transformative design across a variety of project types and scales, from large urban districts and complex post-industrial sites to detailed design projects. With a background in urban planning and landscape architecture, Lisa has helped to reshape New York City’s public spaces for 20 years, including the design and delivery of the High Line since 2004, Domino Park in Brooklyn, the transformative master plan for Staten Island’s Freshkills Park, the public spaces at South Street Seaport’s Pier 17 and Gansevoort Peninsula in Manhattan. Other signature projects include Santa Monica’s Tongva Park, Philadelphia’s Race Street Pier, Newark’s Riverfront Park, Nicollet Mall in Minneapolis, The Underline in Miami, Shelby Farms Park in Memphis, and the master plan for Seattle’s Central Waterfront. Lisa currently serves as the President of the Landscape Architecture Foundation. In 2008, she was a Rome Prize recipient at the American Academy in Rome. She has a Bachelor in Urban Planning with a focus on Community Development Planning from the University of Illinois, and a Master of Landscape Architecture from the University of Pennsylvania. Lisa has taught graduate-level design studios and lectured at universities, symposiums, foundations, and institutions around the world.

 

The 2,200-acre Freshkills Park in Staten Island has been a foundational work at Field Operations since 2001, transforming a massive sanitary landfill into the largest park to be developed in New York City in over 100 years. Over time, the engineered landscape has become a place for wildlife, recreation, science, education, and art. Freshkills Park absorbed a critical part of Hurricane Sandy’s storm surge, underscoring the importance of soft infrastructure solutions to create a more resilient New York. Photo by Rebecka Gordan.