Jessica was photographed by Dawn Bowery. Trevor was photographed by Sahar Coston-Hardy
OLIN is proud to announce the elevation of Jessica M. Henson and Trevor Lee to the role of Partner. As longtime associates in the studio, Jessica and Trevor have helped lead some of the office’s most notable projects of the last decade, including the Los Angeles River Master Plan Update, the new United States Embassy in London, Hudson River Park’s newly opened Pier 26, and the next-generation revitalization of Denver’s 16th Street Mall. Jessica and Trevor each bring a keen passion for transforming the public realm at markedly different and uniquely complex scales, complementing and deepening the diversity of the OLIN partner group.
JESSICA HENSON
Jessica’s work explores the intersection of environmental systems, social justice, and equity, with a focus on the interconnected relationships between hydrological, cultural, and social systems. Since joining OLIN in 2010, Jessica has contributed to numerous projects that seek to create socially and environmentally resilient infrastructures including a comprehensive update to the Los Angeles River Master Plan, one of the first design proposals for a large-scale wildlife crossing over a major U.S. interstate, and Meeting Green, a winning entry in the Philadelphia Water Department’s Soak It Up! design competition examining scalable urban green infrastructure strategies. Her other significant projects include collaborations with Studio Gang Architects on Chicago’s new Vista Tower and O’Hare International Airport, a new residential precinct at the University of Washington in Seattle, and the landscape of the new U.S. Embassy in London.
In addition to her project work, Jessica served as an Assistant Clinical Professor and Undergraduate Programs Chair in the landscape architecture department at the University of Illinois and currently lectures at the University of Southern California. In 2019, she co-authored the book Fresh Water: Design Research for Inland Water Territories with fellow UIUC professor Mary Pat McGuire. “Our challenge as landscape architects in the 21st-century is to balance where we are in our cultural history with our environmental systems and climate change in a way that promotes ecosystem function, public health, and equity,” Jessica remarks. As a partner, she plans to expand upon these themes in her work on commissioned projects and in research and academia.
Jessica grew up in a rural community perched on the bluffs overlooking the Mississippi River in West Central Illinois. At a young age, she witnessed firsthand the overwhelming power of the river when in 1993 a major flood event overran 400,000 square miles of land across nine states. An early fascination with tinkering and building took Jessica to the Illinois Institute of Technology, where she first studied architecture and engineering before discovering the landscape architecture program. “Finally, at that moment, in my fourth year of undergrad, my childhood in the forest with my interest in engineering and my interest in architecture all clicked,” she recalls. “There was a profession where all things I’d been doing my whole life fit together.”
Following her time at IIT, Jessica joined the Master of Landscape Architecture program at the University of Pennsylvania’s Stuart Weitzman School of Design. Penn connected her to OLIN partners Lucinda Sanders and Susan Weiler, who invited Jessica to OLIN as an extern and then an intern, where she assisted on major design competitions and other work before formally joining the firm as a Landscape Designer following her graduation from Penn. Her early years at OLIN were marked by a diverse portfolio of projects, including the London Embassy, the Syracuse Connective Corridor, and Hunts Point: Lifelines, one of six winning proposals in the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Rebuild by Design competition.
In 2013, Jessica accepted an invitation from UIUC to serve as the landscape architecture department’s first designer-in-residence, focusing on demographic shifts between urban and rural regions, particularly in the Midwest landscape. From 2014 through 2018, she continued her work at the university as a practice professor while continuing at OLIN. In 2018 Jessica relocated to the OLIN Los Angeles studio to help lead the office as well as a major new commission to index and synthesize more than 20 years of design studies, planning initiatives, and socioeconomic research spanning more than 17 municipalities along the Los Angeles River. This work led to the collaboration of OLIN, Geosyntec, and Gehry Partners on the Los Angeles County LA River Master Plan Update for the entire 51-mile length of the river--an unprecedented, cross-jurisdictional effort with the goal of guiding future investment, water quality, and flood management initiatives, public realm and ecosystem enhancements, and projects that have many public benefits with a focus on social equity, public health, and resiliency for the next 25 years. The plan, slated for completion in 2021, has already received wide acclaim for its holistic and deeply researched approach and was exhibited at the McHarg Center’s landmark Design with Nature Now symposium in 2019.
TREVOR LEE
Trevor’s work focuses on transformative landscapes, the rethinking of how we foster social life through meaningful cultural and ecological engagement and design. He has worked alternately as a designer, researcher, instructor, and advisor over 18 years in both professional practice and academia, including more than a decade with OLIN. With his background and interests in art, graphic design, and illustration, he considers ways to create immersive, embedded experiences by foregrounding cultural, technological, and ecological frameworks within the landscape. He has brought this approach to many of OLIN’s signature projects, including the LEED Platinum-certified forestry school at Yale University, Syracuse Connective Corridor in upstate New York, the 21st-century revitalization of Denver’s 16th Street Mall, a landmark reimagining of the public realm surrounding the Los Angeles Convention Center, and Manhattan’s newest park, Pier 26 at Hudson River Park.
Beyond his work at OLIN, Trevor has taught extensively through faculty positions as a lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania, a Visiting Assistant Professor and Third Year Undergraduate Coordinator at the Illinois Institute of Technology, and as a Design Fellow at Syracuse University. While a Design Fellow, Trevor led a two-year research project titled Formerly Urban, investigating the benefits of the creation of a new urbanity in rustbelt cities with large population loss. This research culminated in a symposium and book titled Formerly Urban: Projecting Rustbelt Futures by Julia Czerniak. Trevor has also researched new technologies in solar and wind science, working with the Land Art Generator Initiative to develop an energy-generating public art sculpture called WindNest. He has worked with other renowned landscape architecture offices on notable commissions, including Section Three of the High Line in New York City and Chicago’s Navy Pier. As a partner, Trevor will continue to expand the transformative influence of landscape architecture at all scales of settlement.
Trevor moved considerably before coming to Philadelphia in 2005. He was born in Lexington, Kentucky, and lived throughout the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast, but was most influenced by a small river town called Marietta, Ohio. The town was intentionally built around ancient burial mounds constructed by the Hopewell and Adena peoples, with the purpose of preserving their cultural heritage. “As an 8-year-old living in Marietta, I would play ball around and on top of these mounds in a park called the “Sacra Via” (sacred way). It certainly left an impression on me, and perhaps my interest in landscape architecture started here without knowing it at the time.” At 17 he joined the Army and served for six years, both in the United States and abroad. In his last year of service, Trevor was accepted at the Massachusetts College of Art in Boston. At Mass Art, he received a degree in illustration but also explored his interests in landscape architecture, landscape urbanism, and the uncertainty of climate change. From there he enrolled in the Masters of Landscape Architecture program at the Rhode Island School of Design.
RISD’s rigorous and iterative, material-based approach to design was influential in shaping Trevor’s understanding of landscape. During and following his graduate studies, he began collaborating with several notable design practices throughout the Boston area, including the office of Mikyoung Kim, the artist Michael Singer, Ron Henderson’s L+A studio, and Martha Schwartz Partners. These offices approached landscape architecture through the exploration of graphic legibility, form, color, ecology, and temporal change. The imageability of landscape was the methodology of expressing narrative and forming the conceptual approach to projects, and Trevor brought this ethos with him when he first joined OLIN in 2005. Trevor’s early projects in the studio included the Brooklyn Atlantic Yards, Potomac Park Levee in Washington, DC, and Yale University’s Science Hill district, including the new home for the forestry school, Kroon Hall.
Trevor left OLIN for an academic appointment at Syracuse University in 2009 but returned in 2013 as Manager of Visual Communications and led numerous major competition efforts. In 2014 Trevor, in collaboration with Partner-in-Charge Lucinda Sanders, led a proposal effort resulting in the winning commission to design Pier 26, the newest addition to Hudson River Park in New York City. Pier 26 is unlike any other pier in Manhattan with its emphasis on research and the educational exploration of the Hudson River estuary. The pier sits at the intersection of urbanity and coastal ecosystems, with moments of recreation, play, and social life. The pier project is representative of the work and research Trevor has completed and will continue to pursue. Pier 26 opened to wide acclaim in September of 2020 and is quickly becoming a beloved destination for all ages in Lower Manhattan.