On July 20, 2016, I was welcomed into a group that was a pleasure to be with. As an architectural designer, it’s not often that I interact with landscape professionals outside of the office and it was a real treat to hear their perspective and meet folks I would not usually have to chance to meet. As a board member for AIA Honolulu, it is always great to collaborate with allied groups to understand how our organizations can support each other. And as a former landscape design

July 10 – 12 marked the 4th annual Diversity Summit—a monumental commitment by the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) to address the crisis of diversity amongst practitioners within the Landscape Architecture profession. Hosted by ASLA at their headquarters in Washington D.C, the Diversity Summit brought together emerging African-American and Latino professionals to share, discuss, and brainstorm strategies on how to meet the challenge of addressing diversity by

For our second monthly nursery tour, we visited Koba's Nursery in Waimanlo. We had the opportunity to sit down with owner Carl Kobashigawa to hear a bit of history about the family business. They began in 1980 working and farming the land before purchasing the current property in 1985. Business began slow as they tested the market and found their niche. Today the nursery sells to landscapers, maintenance crews, hotels, resorts, and directly to home owners. The nursery tour fo

Following last week’s Landscape Architect Registration Examination (L.A.R.E.) Prep Focus Group kick-off Pau Hana, the second event, a webinar about the licensing process, took place on July 13th. We were very fortunate to have Missy Sutton, a Member Engagement Specialist from the Council of Landscape Architectural Registration Board (CLARB) as presenter and Joel Kurokawa, Principal of Ki Concepts Hawaii from the Hawaii Licensure Board to answer questions about Hawaii’s specif

My name is Julian Rosario and I'm the newest member in town. A little about myself- I graduated from the landscape architecture program at the University of California, Davis in 2014 and was working in the San Francisco Bay Area before coming to the 'aina in April. Early on this trip I met Joel Kurokawa and felt an instant connection to his practice. Along with the next two weeks of eating, surfing, stargazing, and eating, I was forced to make the move and happy to say, I sta