Job Search and Opportunities for MLA Students

Seek out career information well before graduation:

Organizations both big and small worldwide are interested in GSD students and alumni. Landscape architecture training brings a wealth of knowledge and transferable skills outside of traditional practice to many industries including but not limited to consulting, planning, government, higher education, non-profits, and beyond.

Below is a snapshot of employers who hire GSD graduates and interns:

SWA Group
AECOM
Agency Landscape + Planning
Central Park Conservancy
Gensler
Hart Howerton
MASS Design Group
Matanataki
Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates
Mikyoung kim Design
Reed Hilderbrand
ROMA Design Group
Sasaki
SCAPE Landscape Architecture
Stoss Landscape Urbanism
Surfacedesign Inc.

Additional Resources for Landscape Architects

Council of Landscape Architectural Registration Boards

Occupational Outlook Handbook for Landscape Architects

Your Path to Landscape Architecture from the ASLA

Francesca Benedetto

Francesca Benedetto (1981) studied architecture at the Politecnico di Milano and the Universidade Técnica de Lisboa. In 2008 she founded YellowOffice, an architectural firm with a particular focus on landscape architecture and urbanism, combining research and design. The practice brings together several scales of design processes: from territorial strategies, urban planning, public spaces, parks, pavilions and cemeteries to objects, videos, illustrations, maps, and exhibitions.

The recurrent themes of this research are about the relationship between City and Nature, public spaces and geographic disciplines, always observed through the lens of visual arts.

YellowOffice has been awarded international prizes and competitions. Among these: Berat 2015, Tirana 2014, Rome 2012, Geneve 2012, Turin 2010, Carso Goriziano 2010. The office has also been part of exhibitions such as the 14th International Architecture Exhibition in Venice and at the first Chicago Architecture Biennial, The State of Art of Architecture. Francesca Benedetto also works in academic fields, teaching and participating in panels and conferences in major Universities (Politecnico di Milano, Cass Cities – London Metropolitan University, University of Limerick, NABA Nuova Accademia di Belle Arti, Domus Academy, IED Istituto Europeo di Design). In 2014 she coordinated the Master in Land Design at IED (Istituto Europeo di Design) in Cagliari, Italy and in 2015 she worked as Italian ambassador for IED.

Kirt Rieder

Kirt is a Lecturer in the Department of Landscape Architecture at the Harvard Graduate School of Design where he co-teaches Ecologies, Techniques, Technologies II. Rieder is a Principal-in-Charge of some of Hargreaves Jones’ most celebrated projects, including the Reinventing the Crescent Master Plan & Crescent Park in New Orleans, Louisiana, the Shaw Center for the Arts in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, as well as contributing to the design of Crissy Field in San Francisco, California. Rieder focuses his design energy on crafting precise topographic surfaces to exacting results, ensuring the promise of universal access coupled with maximum legibility of designed landscapes.  His expertise in the resilient planning and construction of urban waterfront landscapes is particularly notable, including the recently completed master plans for the Richmond Riverfront Plan, the James River Park Master Plan, and the completed construction for the wildly popular T. Tyler Potterfield Memorial Bridge, all in Richmond, Virginia. A powerful proponent for landscape architecture and the potential of public open space to drive the physical and cultural evolution of cities, Mr. Rieder demonstrates how challenging and complicated sites can be creatively and strategically reconfigured as historical and ecological destinations.

Mr. Rieder holds a Master of Landscape Architecture from Harvard’s Graduate School of Design and a Bachelor of Urban Planning from the University of Cincinnati. He is a registered landscape architect in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and is the co-chair of both the City of Salem Planning Board and the Salem Tree Commission.

Christopher Matthews

Chris Matthews teaches courses in plants as a design medium. Chris is an Associate Principal and design leader in the Cambridge Office of Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates with over 25 years of experience in the practice of Landscape Architecture in London, Tokyo, and Cambridge. A broad cultural perspective and a conviction that the designed landscape can deeply transform our everyday lives underpin Chris’ work. He is an expert in the use of vegetation in design, and creates landscapes that explore history, infrastructure, ecology, and contemporary program to create, memorable and transformative places. Chris’ recent work includes: the new Visitors Center at Walden Pond, Master Plans for the historic Hermann Park and the Buffalo Bayou East Sector, both in Houston, TX; the Clybourn Corridor Master Plan on the North Branch River in Chicago, Il; the Landscape Master Plan and design of multiple new urban places and landscapes for Cambridge Crossing and the Alexandria Center, both in Cambridge, MA and the revitalization of the Boston Flower Exchange.

Originally from England, Chris earned a Bachelor of Arts in Landscape Architecture with honors from Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland. He received a Master of Landscape Architecture from Harvard’s Graduate School of Design in 2001.

Charles Waldheim

Charles Waldheim is the John E. Irving Professor of Landscape Architecture, Director of the Office for Urbanization, and Co-Director of the Master in Design Studies program at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. He is an American-Canadian architect and urbanist. Waldheim’s research examines the relations between landscape, ecology, and contemporary urbanism. He is author, editor, or co-editor of numerous books on these subjects, and his writing has been published and translated internationally. Waldheim is recipient of the Rome Prize Fellowship from the American Academy in Rome; the Visiting Scholar Research Fellowship at the Study Centre of the Canadian Centre for Architecture; the Cullinan Chair at Rice University; and the Sanders Fellowship at the University of Michigan.

Michael Van Valkenburgh

Michael R. Van Valkenburgh, Charles Eliot Professor in Practice of Landscape Architecture, Emeritus, has taught at the GSD since 1982. He served as program director from 1987-89 and for a term as chairman of the department from 1991-96.

As founding principal of Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, Inc. (MVVA), with offices in New York City and Cambridge, Van Valkenburgh has designed a wide range of project types ranging from intimate gardens to full-scale urban design undertakings. Some of his recent projects include Brooklyn Bridge Park in New York City, the Lower Don Lands in Toronto, and the Monk’s Garden at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston. Most recently, the firm has been commissioned to design the landscape for the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago and master plan the 308-acre Dorothea Dix Park in Raleigh. MVVA has received numerous design awards, including ASLA Firm of the Year in 2016 and the Brendan Gill Prize from the Municipal Art Society of New York in 2010 for Brooklyn Bridge Park, which is presented annually to the work of art that best captures the spirit and energy of New York City.

Van Valkenburgh was the 2003 recipient of the Smithsonian Institution’s Cooper Hewitt National Design Award for Environmental Design, and in 2010 became the second landscape architect in history to receive the Arnold W. Brunner Memorial Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters for contributions to architecture as an art. In 2011 he was named a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, where he is one of only three landscape architects on its roster of members. He is also a Fellow of the American Academy in Rome and the ASLA.

Van Valkenburgh earned a BS in Landscape Architecture from Cornell University and an MLA from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In 2008, Yale University Press published Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates: Reconstructing Urban Landscapes, a book on his firm’s work. Van Valkenburgh’s approach to creating landscapes and public spaces has also been featured in a wide range of publications, most notably Art in America and Harvard Magazine .

See selected projects.

Publications About

Articles

Belinda Tato

Belinda Tato is Associate Professor in Practice of Landscape Architecture at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design.

Tato and Jose Luis Vallejo are founding members of ecosistema urbano , a Madrid based group of architects and urban designers operating within the fields of urbanism, architecture, engineering and sociology.  Vallejo and Tato define their approach as urban social design, by which they understand the design of environments, spaces and dynamics in order to improve the self-organization of citizens, social interaction within communities and their relationship with the environment. Ecosistema urbano has used this philosophy to design and implement projects in Norway, Denmark, Spain, Italy, France and China.

Ecosistema urbano’s principal members were educated in several different European universities and come from many diverse urban environments (Madrid, London, Brussels, Rome, Paris). They have taught as visiting professors and have given workshops and lectures at the most prestigious institutions worldwide (Harvard, Yale, UCLA, Cornell, Iberoamericana, RIBA, Copenhagen, Munich, Paris, Milan, Shanghai, to list a few). They did this while implementing urban action and intervention in cities in Europe, the Americas and Asia.

Since 2000, their work has been nationally and internationally awarded on more than 30 occasions. In 2005 ecosistema urbano received the European Acknowledgement Award from the Holcim Foundation for Sustainable Construction. In 2006, they were awarded the Architectural Association and the Environments, Ecology and Sustainability Research Cluster award. In 2007 they were nominated for the European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture / Mies van der Rohe Award for emerging European architects. They were also selected out of more than 400 teams from around the world to receive an AR Award for Emerging Architecture in London, 2007. In 2008 ecosistema urbano won the Arquia/Próxima prize, awarded by the Caja de Arquitectos Foundation to the best project drawn up by young architects from 2006-2007. In 2009, they were nominated from more than 500 teams to be a worldwide finalist and recipient of the Holcim Award for Sustainable Construction, Silver Award.

John R. Stilgoe

John Stilgoe, Robert and Lois Orchard Professor in the History of Landscape Development, Emeritus, held a joint appointment in the Harvard Faculties of Arts and Science and Design. He offered courses on the history and future of the North American built landscape.

Author of What Is Landscape? (2015), Old Fields:  Photography, Glamour, and Fantasy Landscape (2014), Train Time:  Railroads and the Imminent Reshaping of the United States Landscape (2007), Landscape and Images (2005), Lifeboat (2003), Outside Lies Magic (1998), Alongshore (1994) and other books,  Stilgoe is a Fellow of the Society of American Historians and winner of the Parkman Medal (1983, for his Common Landscape of America), the ASLA Williams Medal, the AIA Medal for collaborative research, the Cabot Fellowship Prize, and other awards. Among his research projects are a book on elites and another on the enduring meanings of Spanish, French, African-American, Portuguese, Canary Island, and related Creole landscape terms north of Haiti and Cuba. He restores and sails antique boats.

Carl Steinitz

Carl Steinitz is the Alexander and Victoria Wiley Professor of Landscape Architecture and Planning, Emeritus, at the Graduate School of Design, Harvard University. In 1967, Professor Steinitz received his PhD degree in City and Regional Planning, with a major in urban design, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He also holds the Master of Architecture degree from MIT and a Bachelor of Architecture degree from Cornell University. In 1966 he began his affiliation with the Harvard Graduate School of Design as a research associate in the Laboratory for Computer Graphics and Spatial Analysis. He has been Professor of Landscape Architecture and Planning at the Graduate School of Design since 1973. He is currently Honorary Professor at the Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis at University College London.

Professor Steinitz has devoted much of his academic and professional career to improving methods to analyze large land areas and make design decisions about conservation and development. His applied research and teaching focus is on highly valued landscapes that are undergoing substantial pressures for change. He is principal author of Alternative Futures for Changing Landscapes (Island Press 2003), author of A Framework for Geodesign, (Esri Press, 2012) and a founding coordinator of the International Geodesign Collaboration.

Professor Steinitz has lectured and given workshops at more than 160 universities. In 1984, the Council of Educators in Landscape Architecture (CELA) presented Professor Steinitz with the Outstanding Educator Award for his “extraordinary contribution to environmental design education” and for his “pioneering exploration in the use of computer technology in landscape planning, especially in the areas of resource management and visual impact assessment.” In 1996 he received the annual “Outstanding Practitioner Award” from the International Society of Landscape Ecology and in 2002, he was honored as one of Harvard University’s outstanding teachers. He has served since 2007 as the External Academic Adviser to the European Union funded LE:NOTRE program to rationalize landscape education in Europe. Professor Steinitz has received the 2015 recipient of the Carpenter Teaching Medal from the American Society of Landscape Architects, and he has several honorary degrees.

Martha Schwartz

Martha Schwartz is a landscape architect, urbanist, and climate activist. Her work and teaching focuses on the urban public realm landscape and its importance in making cities “climate ready”.  For more than 40 years, she and the firm, Martha Schwartz Partners,  have completed projects around the globe, from site-specific art installations to public spaces, parks, master-planning and reclamation. Schwartz is now engaged in strategic land-use and landscape planning in assisting leadership in their preparation for effects of climate change that their city will be facing in the near future.

Ms. Schwartz is a founder and participant of the GSD Climate Change Working Group, which gave shape to the first ever required climate change course to incoming students in 2020. She also has mounted a seminar in conjugation with Harvard’s School of Engineering and Applied Science on the topic of geoengineering.

Schwartz foresees landscape architecture as the leading profession to face the challenge of Climate Change. At the Landscape Architecture Foundation’s 2016 “New Landscape Declaration” summit on Landscape Architecture and the Future, Martha’s “Declaration” on climate change became the key proponent of the industry’s current position that Climate Change is a central issue to the practice.

She is a founding member of the Working Group of Sustainable Cities at the Harvard University Center for the Environment, a founding member of the Landscape Architecture Foundation ‘s “Working Group on Climate Change”, and has recently founded MAYDAY. Earth, a non-profit organization focused on Climate Communications and Education for non-scientists and generalists about Nature Based and Geoengineering Solutions which act at a global scale and can be integrated into practice, thus expanding the role of landscape architecture.

Awarded the 2020 ASLA Design Medal, Ms. Schwartz is the recipient of numerous international recognitions, including the Honorary Royal Designer for Industry Award from the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce for her outstanding contribution to UK design; the Cooper Hewitt National Design Award; the Women in Design Award for Excellence from the Boston Society of Architects; an Honorary Doctor of Science from the University of Ulster in Belfast, Ireland; a fellowship from the Urban Design Institute; visiting residencies at Radcliffe College and the American Academy in Rome; an Honorary Fellowship from the Royal Institute of British Architects; the Council of Fellows Award by the American Society of Landscape Architects and most recently a Doctor Honoris Causa from the Boston Architectural College.