Reconnecting Landscapes: Resilient Planting Design in Ecologically Deficient Zones - 1.0 PDH (LA CES/HSW)

Molly Bourne sees landscape architecture practice as a medium to celebrate and explore the environment and our place within it. She is deeply dedicated to elevated design thinking that advances the public good. Since joining the firm in 1999, Molly has led award-winning, multidisciplinary teams on high-profile projects for waterfront parks, cultural institutions, and urban revitalization. Activating public space dialogue, tackling climate change, reclaiming industrial sites and shorelines, and protecting pollinators are her professional passions. 

Developing the next generation of practitioners, Molly is a visiting lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania Weitzman School of Design and volunteers with the ACE Mentor Program for New York City high school students. She enjoys engaging with the profession and public alike, speaking widely, leading site tours, and exchanging inventive ideas about how to better urban environments. 

Molly’s key projects include the East Side Coastal Resiliency Project, Governors Island Park and Public Space, Waterline Square, South Bronx Greenway Master Plan and Implementation, the Theodore Roosevelt Sanctuary and Audubon Center Master Plan and Implementation, and the Renovation of Roberto Clemente State Park. Molly received her BA at the University of Florida.

Thomas Rainer is a registered landscape architect, teacher, and author living in Arlington, Virginia. Thomas, a leading voice in ecological landscape design, has designed landscapes for the U.S. Capitol grounds, Arlington National Cemetery, and The New York Botanical Garden, as well as over 100 gardens from Maine to Florida. He is a celebrated public speaker who has garnered acclaim for his passionate presentations to audiences across the U.S. and in Europe. Thomas serves as a Principal for the landscape architectural firm Phyto Studio in Washington, D.C.

Andrew Lavallee, FASLA, RLA is a partner at SiteWorks Landscape Architecture, LLC. He has more than three decades of experience as a designer and construction manager. He leads his firm’s technical design practice focusing on multidisciplinary public realm projects including executive landscape architecture services, specification writing, cost estimating for both construction and post-installation management, and strategic planning for construction, procurement, site implementation logistics, and post-construction site management. Andrew is also an Adjunct Professor with the City College of New York Graduate Landscape Architecture Program.