At this year’s DJC Oregon Women of Vision Awards, Mayer/Reed Founding Partner Emeritus Carol Mayer-Reed, FASLA, will be honored with the Lois Cohen Lifetime Achievement Award. The award recognizes Carol’s pioneering leadership in landscape architecture and lasting contributions to communities of the Pacific Northwest.
“What distinguishes Carol’s leadership is her combination of vision and pragmatism. She has consistently brought ambitious ideas into complex, real-world projects through collaboration, persistence and careful attention to people and place,” says Erica Rife, Executive Director of the Architecture Foundation of Oregon and award nominator. “Her legacy is not only the remarkable places she helped create, but also the expanded vision of what landscape architecture—and landscape architects—can contribute to Oregon’s future.”
In 1983, Carol established her own landscape architecture practice, and in 1987 she formalized a partnership with Michael Reed to create the interdisciplinary design firm, Mayer/Reed. Her visionary work helped shape signature places throughout the Pacific Northwest and continues to demonstrate how landscape architecture can be a powerful tool for civic engagement, urban renewal and ecological transformation. Her portfolio includes the Vera Katz Eastbank Esplanade, Rain Garden at the Oregon Convention Center, MAX Orange Line, Bend’s Old Mill District, Willamette Falls Riverwalk Concept Design, the OMSI District Central City Master Plan, renovations at the Oregon State Capitol and Vista Pavilion at Oregon Health Sciences University.
Carol is recognized nationally as ASLA Fellow and continues to contribute to community initiatives in the region. Throughout her career, she has remained invested in the next generation. She was a founding board member of Oregon’s ACE Mentor Program that connects high school students with careers in architecture, construction and engineering. She served on the board of the Architecture Foundation of Oregon, supporting programs including Architects in Schools, and spent nine years on the Board of Visitors at the University of Oregon.
Carol’s legacy is woven into Mayer/Reed. She founded the firm as a women-owned business at a time when women were underrepresented in leadership across the design professions. Today, the firm remains a women-owned business led by Kathy Fry, SEGD, Shannon Simms, ASLA, and Jeramie Shane, ASLA. Principals and owners Kathy Fry and Shannon Simms are past DJC Women of Vision Honorees.
We are proud to celebrate Carol and this well-deserved recognition of her remarkable career, the practice she built and the lasting influence she continues to have on our profession and community.