Landscape Processes Discussion Series: Kotchakorn Voraakhom

Kotchakorn Voraakhom, CEO and founder of Landprocess and Porous City Network, will discuss her work as part of the Landscape Processes online discussion series.

Presented as part of the spring 2021 Landscape Technology and Landscape elective courses taught by lecturer Alexandra Mei, the Landscape Processes series engages with seven practitioners to explore the details, materials, and technologies embedded in the practice of landscape architecture. Each discussion will focus on the guest speaker's body of work and how their processes to design are pushing the field of landscape architecture forward. During each event, attendees are invited to ask questions in a moderated discussion with the guest speaker. The lectures are enabled by the support of the Sam Fox School's Master of Landscape Architecture program. In partnership with ASLA St. Louis, the Sam Fox School is also providing free online LACES approved credits for this lecture series.

Kotchakorn Voraakhom is a landscape architect from Thailand who works on building productive green public space that tackles climate change in urban dense areas and climate-vulnerable communities.

Opened in 2017, Chulalongkorn Centenary Park is the first critical piece of green infrastructure in Bangkok to reduce urban flood risk. With on-site water management, the park can collect, treat, and hold up to one million gallons of water, alleviating overwhelmed public sewage during heavy rainfall. In 2019, Thammasat Urban Rooftop Farm, Asia’s largest, was opened. Landprocess repurposed wasted rooftop space to address food and water scarcity in preparation for future climate challenges. In 2020, Chao Phraya Sky Park was realized. Once an inaccessible and incomplete sky railway, the old ruins are now whole, becoming the first realized bridge park to cross a river in any capital city in the world.

Voraakhom is featured in the 2019 TIME 100 Next list from TIME magazine, which spotlights 100 rising stars who are shaping the future of the world. She is also on the list of 15 women fighting against climate change from TIME. This year she was named to the lists for the BBC 100 Women and the Green 30 for 2020 by Bloomberg. Recently, she got an award from United Nations as a winner of the 2020 UN Global Climate Action Awards, Women for Results. Voraakhom is a chairwoman on the landscape without the border of the International Federation of Landscape Architects, Asia Pacific Region (IFLA APR). She is a TED Fellow, Echoing Green Climate Fellow, and Atlantic Fellow. She received her master's in landscape architecture from Harvard University's Graduate School of Design.