Gena Wirth, RLA, is Design Principal and Partner at SCAPE. She works with cities, community advocates and landowners to reveal the immense ecological and cultural potential of public landscapes.
As Design Principal, Gena translates research into practice, leading the design and implementation of complex, multi-stakeholder landscapes—including public and private waterfronts, regional trail systems, parks, plazas and climate adaptation plans. Within SCAPE, Gena leads firm-wide design standards, ensuring excellence from concept through construction, and serves as Principal-in-Charge for a wide range of projects across the U.S. spanning typologies and scales.
Gena is also a tenacious advocate for ecological systems design across the design fields—both as a member of the Dredge Research Collaborative, a non-profit group, and through past teaching positions at Harvard, Columbia, Syracuse and Rutgers. She also serves on SCAPE’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee (DEIC), helping advance the firm’s commitments to social and racial justice within our work and throughout the field. She holds a Master’s in Landscape Architecture and Master of Urban Planning with Distinction from the Graduate School of Design (GSD) at Harvard University and a Bachelor’s in Horticulture from the University of Delaware.
Credentials
Registered Landscape Architect (RLA): New York, Arkansas, Massachusetts
Accomplishments
Academic
Visiting Professor, Harvard University, Graduate School of Design (GSD), Department of Landscape Architecture, 2021
Visiting Critic, Syracuse University, School of Architecture, 2016 & 2018
Lecturer, Rutgers University, School of Environmental & Biological Sciences, 2012
Adjunct Assistant Professor, Columbia University, Graduate School of Architecture, Planning & Preservation (GSAPP), 2010 – 2013
Board & Advisory Roles
Member, Dredge Research Collaborative
Board, Awesome Newburgh Foundation
Select Awards
National Design Award, Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, 2019
Fast Company: Innovation By Design Award Finalist – Spaces and Places, “Greenpoint Library and Environmental Education Center,” 2021
ASLA-NY: Honor Award – Analysis, Planning, Research & Communications, “The Chattahoochee RiverLands,” 2021
ASLA-NY: Merit Award – General Design, “Greenpoint Library and Environmental Education Center,” 2021
ASLA Florida: Honor Award – Analysis & Planning, “McCoy’s Creek Recreation & Restoration Plan,” 2021
ASLA Kentucky: Merit Award – Analysis & Planning, “The Chattahoochee RiverLands,” 2021
ASLA Professional Awards: Honor Award – Analysis & Planning, “Public Sediment for Alameda Creek,” 2019
The Architect’s Newspaper: Best of Design, Honor Award – Unbuilt (Cultural), “Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts,” 2019
ASLA Professional Awards: Honor Award – Communications, “DredgeFest Event Series,” 2016