Meet LPA: Xinzhuo An, Project Landscape Architect

Growing in Her Profession

During her early years growing up in the Chinese port city of Tianjin, Xinzhuo An would ride her bike through the peaceful streets, admiring the elegant facades of the European-style mansions and gardens. Later, her interests in architecture, urban design and environmental engineering led her to study landscape architecture at the University of Minnesota, followed by a master’s degree from the University of Washington.

Today, she is helping to grow LPA’s landscape architecture practice in Texas. With 10 years of experience, stretching from Beijing to San Francisco, she helps to design and manage project teams, with an eye for conceptualizing and fine-tuning construction documents. She gravitates toward public and education projects, where she can combine functionality and aesthetics. “It’s an opportunity to see the results and the reaction so much more directly,” she says.

In her spare time, she can often be found visiting landmark Central Texas landscape architecture projects, going to symposiums, visiting nurseries and exploring the indigenous plant communities along local hiking trails. “Landscape architecture is not a dead-water industry,” Xinzhuo An says. She has a thirst for immersing herself in nature and the design world. “Basically, anything that could help me approach nature is something I’m always interested in,” she says.