Landscape designer, urbanist and artist to speak in Stuckeman School series

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Sara Zewde, founding principal of Studio Zewde — a design firm practicing at the intersection of landscape design, urbanism and public art, will speak on Nov. 6 as part of the Stuckeman School’s Lecture and Exhibit Series. Hosted by the Penn State Department of Landscape Architecture, “Ecologies of Memory” will begin at 6 p.m. in the Stuckeman Family Building Jury Space at University Park.

Zewde specializes in the design of the contemporary Southern city, design and development in historically black neighborhoods, the history and memory of the trans-Atlantic slave trade, and the politics of public space. Her work has been exhibited at the 2016 and 2018 Venice Biennale, in the Brazilian and U.S national pavilions. 

Zewde was named the 2014 National Olmsted Scholar by the Landscape Architecture Foundation and a 2016 Artist-in-Residence at the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation. In 2018, she was named to the National Trust for Historic Preservation's inaugural "40 Under 40: People Saving Places" list.

Zewde holds a master of landscape architecture degree from the Harvard University Graduate School of Design, a master of city planning from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a bachelor’s degree in sociology and statistics from Boston University.

Based in New York City, Studio Zewde blends its employees’ multidisciplinary backgrounds in landscape architecture, architecture, city planning, urban design, sociology, statistics, community organizing and public art to create “enduring places where people belong.” The firm has been lauded for its design methodology that syncs site interpretation and narrative with a dedication to the craft of construction.