With over 35 years’ experience working in the New York City area, Landscape Architect Laura Starr is a champion for sustainability, collaboration, and design excellence. As Chief of Design for the Central Park Conservancy, Laura forged consensus among diverse groups of stakeholders to renovate major destinations such as the Harlem Meer, West Side, and Great Lawn. As a founding partner of Starr Whitehouse, she continues to nurture ties between the public, the city, and professional organizations. She has negotiated public-private partnerships both internationally, on master plans for Tel Aviv’s Park Ariel Sharon and Jerusalem’s Gazelle Park, as well as locally, collaborating with The Battery Conservancy on a dozen designs including the award-winning Bosque and Playscape. She has designed immersive residential landscapes for the Durst Organization and BIG Architects’ VIA 57 West, L+M’s 25 Park Row, and thousands of affordable units across New York City.

Since Hurricane Sandy hit New York in 2012, Laura has contributed significantly to the City’s resilience response. She developed open space strategy for the Mayor’s Special Initiative for Rebuilding and Resiliency, speaheaded landscape design and community engagement for The BIG U (a winning Rebuild By Design team), led NYC Parks’ A Vision for a Resilient East Harlem study, and currently supports the City’s Climate Strong Communities intiative. In that time, she has run dozens of community workshops to gather feedback and build informed consensus around strategies to defend against climate change while strengtherning neighborhood identity. As a member of Manhattan’s Community Board 1, she also serves on the Board’s resiliency taskforce. Today, Laura is seen as a leader in the field of sustainable landscape design and a strong advocate for a city that is greener and more responsive to the needs of a twenty-first century public.