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Left to right: Jie Han, Associate ASLA. Colleen Williams, PLA / image: Chris Smith. Mandi Fung, ASLA, PLA / image: Sahar Coston-Hardy

ASLA’s Women in Landscape Architecture Professional Practice Network (WILA PPN) is sharing the next set of profiles of women in the profession (see the previous installment right here). If you’d like to be featured, the PPN’s call for submissions remains open, with profiles being shared on an ongoing basis.

Submit a WILA profile!

These profiles will appear on the PPN’s LinkedIn group, Facebook group, and here on The Field. This post includes: Jie Han, Associate ASLA, Colleen Williams, PLA, and Mandi Fung, ASLA, PLA.

Jie Han, Associate ASLA

What inspired you to pursue a career in landscape architecture?

I grew up close to nature, constantly sketching rivers, trees, and open spaces. When I moved to more urbanized environments, I became aware of the disconnection between people and natural systems. I realized I wanted to design landscapes that could heal that gap, spaces that serve both ecological functions and human needs.

Who are the female role models who have influenced your career?

Maya Lin has been a major influence on my journey. I read her book Topologies in high school, and it opened my eyes to how design could be both poetic and deeply grounded in place. Her work helped me realize that landscape architecture could be a powerful way to engage with memory, culture, and the environment, and ultimately led me to pursue it in college. I’m also shaped by the women I’ve met along the way—mentors, professors, and collaborators—who model integrity, resilience, and care in both their design work and their leadership.

What advice do you have for other women pursuing a career in landscape architecture?

Being a woman in this profession often requires extra toughness. Be confident and assertive when working with contractors, architects, and other project teams. Your voice deserves to be heard. Trust your perspective, keep building your knowledge, and surround yourself with people who support your growth.

Can you share with us a project you are particularly proud of and why?

I’m proud of my Recovered Wetland project, which restores a degraded wetland damaged by pollution and habitat loss. By improving water flow, using phytoremediation, and reconnecting habitats, the design supports native species and biodiversity. Winning an ASLA Northern California Chapter Honor Award for this project gave me valuable recognition.

What advice would you give your younger self?

I would tell my younger self to invest time in building a strong professional network. Connections with mentors and peers provide essential support and opportunities throughout career.

Colleen Williams, PLA

What inspired you to pursue a career in landscape architecture?

My parents are architects, so you could say it runs in my blood. I grew up surrounded by design projects and was often taken to job sites. As a kid (and to this day), I felt a strong pull to the outdoors and spent a lot of time camping, hiking, swimming in the ocean, and getting lost in the woods at my grandparents’ farm. Landscape architecture is a fusion of those two things: designing spaces and using nature as the medium. And isn’t that the dream?

Who are the female role models who have influenced your career?

My first job out of college was at Rhodeside & Harwell, a planning and landscape architecture firm in Alexandria, VA. Two of the three founders were women: Deana Rhodeside and Faye Harwell, FASLA. It was inspirational to work for two women who were such strong designers (and chic to boot!) but had also founded a firm in a time when few women were starting design practices. It set the tone for my career and showed me there is a strong path forward for women in this field.

Over my working experience, I’ve worked with and for a myriad of women—both in the places I’ve worked, and as partners and clients on project teams, who have been creative, diligent, and thoughtful. My current team leader, Mary Tweel, has been such a wonderful example of how to be an excellent landscape architect and lead a full and well-rounded life outside of work.

2024 Women Build Week / image: SeamonWhiteside

What advice do you have for other women pursuing a career in landscape architecture?

Find a way to continue pursuing your ‘why.’ It is sometimes easy to get lost in the grind of daily duties, production, coordination, and project budgets and constraints, but hold on to what really excites you. Whether it’s building communities, creating lasting ecologies, or envisioning really innovative and rad spaces, if you keep advocating for and pushing the envelope on those things, something great will happen.

Can you share with us a project you are particularly proud of and why?

We recently completed a Sea Level Rise Adaptation Plan for the City of Isle of Palms, SC. Working with our internal water resources team, we studied near-range projections and potential impacts of sea level rise and tidal flooding on the barrier island. While I typically gravitate towards more true design work, I am especially proud of this project because coastal resiliency is such an urgent matter here in Charleston. It was rewarding to contribute to a plan with long-term value, both protecting the island ecology and the community of people who live there.

St. Peter’s Church Redevelopment Ribbon Cutting, South Carolina / image: SeamonWhiteside

What advice would you give your younger self?

Always speak up if you have a good design idea! There have been so many times when I had a thought that I thought would solve a problem, but didn’t say anything because I was too scared to speak up—what if I was totally wrong? But sometimes it was the right answer, and someone else said it later. Staying quiet doesn’t help the project. Likewise, one of the most important lessons I have learned is that the best ideas truly come from collaboration. Asking for help when you’re stuck or unsure will often lead to the best solution most of the time.

Mandi Fung, ASLA, PLA

What inspired you to pursue a career in landscape architecture?

I suppose I have two main things that inspired me to pursue landscape architecture. The first was my youth in rural Washington state. I grew up six miles from the Idaho border, so suffice to say, it was pretty remote. I was always outside, and nature and the landscape felt so expansive there and present throughout my upbringing. I also had many friends and family that relied on agriculture to survive. It gave me an appreciation for how far-reaching landscape architecture can be and how many different disciplines are involved. That time of my life has felt like a counterpoint to my adulthood spent living in northeastern cities.

The second thing is that I thought I wanted to be an architect and went to art school (Pratt Institute) to pursue that. I didn’t know that landscape architecture was an option at the time. During school and my following years working in the profession, I realized I was more interested in the design of public space than buildings. I was interested in the fuzziness and liminal spaces that landscape affords, and design school helped me figure that out. I was lucky to be at a school that was pretty open-minded about design and gave me a solid foundation in theory, which helped with my transition to landscape architecture.

Community engagement session, Read House, Delaware / image: courtesy of Mandi Fung

Who are the female role models who have influenced your career?

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention my mom. She was a single, working mother and balanced family and career in a way that I feel like I’ve only been able to appreciate now as an adult and a parent. She made the space within her life to foster my interests and held a lot of trust in me. She always took me hiking and camping and didn’t ever want me to miss out on the memories that other kids were building with their families, even though ours was different from my peers. At the same time, she was a computer programmer in the early days of that field and thrived in a space that maybe wasn’t built with her in mind. I think it’s all given me a roadmap of ways to enjoy both my career and parenthood. Both aspects of my life are important and valid.

In addition to my mom, there is a whole host of other women who have been mentors and colleagues to me over the years, and who have taught me so much. I want to name check a few of them: Alissa Ujie Diamond, Chloe Hawkins, Heidi Petersen, Alisha Savage, Sandra Nam Cioffi, Sam Dabney, Jen Trompetter, ASLA, Jen Jessup, Zu Ponca, Kate Snider Tabony, Kari Roynesdal, ASLA, Andisheh Ghofranitabari. Each of these women has modeled a different attitude and mode of operating as women in landscape architecture. They represent both the breadth of the field and the breadth of femininity.

Community engagement session / image: courtesy of Mandi Fung

I was also lucky to have three professors during my undergraduate years who embraced my interest in landscape architecture and guided me towards this wonderful career: Dragana Zoric, Erika Hinrichs, and Suzan Wines.

Flower Show build / image: courtesy of Mandi Fung

What advice do you have for other women pursuing a career in landscape architecture?

Find your communities—people that you can identify with, gab with, and will be there to help sort out your challenges and celebrate your successes along the way. Landscape architecture is a team sport, and you want to find a cohort to grow with over the course of your career. That cohort might not be in landscape—aligning yourself with artists, writers, designers, and other creatives can help you stay nimble. You get to learn what other people are doing outside of your own field and see what you can glean from them and integrate into your practice.

Colonial National Historical Park, Yorktown, Virginia / image: courtesy of Mandi Fung

Can you share with us a project you are particularly proud of and why?

I am most proud of my work on public projects and cultural landscapes, especially places that pull forward many messy embedded narratives that overlap and conflict and highlight how a landscape has changed over time.

On site at the National World War I Memorial in Washington, DC, during construction / image: courtesy of Mandi Fung

I’m particularly proud of the body of work for the National Park Service I’ve gotten to contribute to. I’ve worked on projects across the east coast, from Mississippi to upstate New York, and from battlefields with Mission 66 structures on top of primary resources to things like the National World War I Memorial at Pershing Park. Each one has held a special spot, and it’s been a wonderful way to experience so many uniquely American landscapes and natural resources.

At the National World War I Memorial sculpture dedication / image: courtesy of Mandi Fung

What advice would you give your younger self?

You aren’t an imposter just because you took a non-traditional route to the profession. Appreciate that the perspective that you bring might be different.

Be open to opportunities as they come up, even if you think you aren’t ready.