Inside the LA Studio—Kounkuey Design Initiative - 1.25 PDH (LA CES/non-HSW)

Chelina is co-founder and Executive Director of KDI. She believes in the potential of low-cost, high-impact design interventions to improve the physical, economic, and social quality of life in low-income communities. Chelina’s expertise covers a range of topics including leadership, participatory planning, social entrepreneurship, urban development, environmental remediation, and social impact design. She has extensive field experience through her work in Africa, Latin America and the US. Having shaped KDI into an internationally recognized and award-winning design, planning and community development firm, she lectures and speaks around the world and writes about KDI’s community-engaged approach to planning and design.

Adriana is a Design Associate at KDI. She is passionate about applying her design experience to help communities in need, marrying a thorough participatory process with an end product that meets all users’ needs. Adriana provides design support for a range of projects including Productive Public Spaces and gender-inclusive urban design. Adriana holds a Bachelor of Architecture from the Catholic University of Honduras and a Master of Landscape Architecture from the University of Southern California.

Lauren is a Senior Design Principal at KDI. Lauren is interested in using landscape architecture as a tool for activism, rethinking the traditional methodologies of the practice to serve community. She manages multiple planning and design projects across a range of scales and has taught at USC, UCLA, and RISD. Lauren holds a BA in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from Princeton University and a Master of Landscape Architecture from the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Christian is a Community Associate at KDI’s Coachella office. He is passionate about social, racial, economic, and environmental justice for underserved communities. A proud resident of the Eastern Coachella Valley, Christian is thrilled to be working in his own backyard, with community members, to develop programming and to advocate for environmental justice. Christian studied Philosophy and Political Science at Loyola University Chicago.

Gina Ford is a landscape architect, co-founder and principal of Agency Landscape + Planning. Underpinning her twenty-five years of practice are a commitment to the design and planning of public places and the perpetuation of the value of landscape architecture via thought leadership, teaching, writing and lecturing.  Her work has received awards from the American Society of Landscape Architects, the American Planning Association and the American Institute of Architects, among others. She is on the board of directors for the City Parks Alliance and the stewardship council of The Cultural Landscape Foundation.