Michelle Villarreal

MICHELLE DANIELA VILLARREAL

Bachelor of Fine Arts 2012, The School of the Art Insitute of Chicago Master of Landscape Architecture+ Urbanism candidate, 2017, University of Southern California Certifications: Horticulture, Harold Washington College, 2013 Archeworks, Sustainable Urban Design, 2015 PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE: ~ARCHEWORKS, Chicago, IL

Work/Study, various projects September 2014-July 2015 ~GRAHAM RESOURCE CENTER LIBRARY, IIT, Chicago, IL

Teacher’s assistant September 2013-May 2014 ~HUMBOLDT PARK SOCIAL SERVICES, Chicago, IL

Interim Housing- Residential Aide February 2011- October 2012 ~GAPERS BLOCK, www.gapersblock.com

Staff writer February 2011- April 2012 ~MEDIA BURN ARCHIVE, Chicago, IL Video intern September 2010-May 2011 ~UROLOGY SPECIALISTS, S.C., Chicago, IL

Assistant to Dr. Laurence Levine June 2008- May 2009 ~ARCHITRAVE, LTD, Chicago, IL

Assistant for Architectural firm May 2007- September 2007 ~ENVIRONMENT ILLINOIS, Chicago, IL

Grassroots organizer, intern May 2006-September 2006

SKILLS: Proficient in Microsoft Office, Adobe InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop, Final Cut Pro, Isometric renderings, AutoCAD, drawing, painting, Rhino 3D Platforms: Mac OS 9/10/X, Windows XP/NT/Vista/Me/2000, Linux, fluent in Spanish, written and spoken

CERTIFICATE PROGRAM ARCHEWORKS, RENDERINGS

This rendering shows a proposed soccer field with swale gardens surrounding for imporoved water draingage

FIRST YEAR MLA- IIT

FIRST YEAR MLA-IIT

This project reworked an exsisting school site, and we incorporated a design that was extrapolated from geometric shapes.

The graphic to the left is a textural rendering of the tree plantings and building existing conditions.

This diagram shows the different infrastructure, the soil types, the waterline and freezing line, etc. It was useful for the campus design project.

FIRST YEAR MLA- IIT

Slip Park is a proposed design strategically incorporating human and migratory bird use simultaneously in a previously unstructured park. The highly curated planting strategy will allow for the landscape to be broken up from east to west encompassing three major planting types-- riparian prairie habitat, which is an island created from cutting into the existing landscape, a low-lying shrub savanna to the south west and woodland to the north west.

Because the planting strategy incorporates plants relevant for specific bird species, it is part of the primary components of the shaping and organization of space. Birds occupy many trophic webs and are outstanding plant pollinators, and to highlight their importance in creating this environment is a priority. The main movement and threshold of this park are the slip that runs through the entire landform, which also becomes a safety device for the seasonal kayakers to move from the kayak launch areas to the Ogden slip and back to the river.

FIRST YEAR MLA- IIT This rendering show the slip created in my proposal for the park. Making a framework where human and bird habitation is possible in creating a distance between the bird habitats and human habitation through proposed slips and screening devices, thus transforming an area that has been fraught with chemical contamination and underutilization. The reflective human program consisting of the slip and areas of observation and exploration is essential strategy for the designed landscape to create a dynamic spatial experience. The human use will consist of encompassing a built second nature and respite from the urban city to the enthralls of a planted landscape, as a way to slip out of, or become disengaged, from a fastening or grasp of the urban context into a place that is set aside for quietude.

FIRST YEAR MLA- IIT

The diagram to the left explains the planting strategy as well as height differentiation and density. An idea of a softer edge at the eastern part of the park was essential in this design, as a soft edge within the larger context of the Chicago River hardly exists, and where it does exist, it is done with little intent. The phenomenological sense of immersion is activated through the sound of water moving within the system of gabions, the birds who are inhabiting the park at that given time, and the activity through a landscape that has a deliberate sense of place.

Seasonal Trend of Migration for Identified Key Species of Concern Utilizing Mississippi Flyway J

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Great Blue Heron

Ardea herodias

Olive-sided Flycatcher Contopus cooperi

Red-headed Woodpecker Melanerpes erythrocephalus

Winged Warbler

Vermivora chrysopterav

Ruddy turnstone

Arenaria interpres

Tufted Titmouse Baeolophus bicolor

Loggerhead Shrike Lanius ludovicianus

Sandhill Crane Grus canadensis

Sanderling Calidris alba

Wood duck Aix sponsa

Lonicera japonica

Amelanchier lavis

Juniperus virginiana

Asclepias purpurascens

Juncus pacificus

Carix stricta Potamogenton pectinatus

Northern Pintail Anas acuta

Bell’s Viro Vireo bellii

Parthenocissus quinquefolia

Illex spp.

Vitis vinifera

Campsis radicans

Baeolophus bicolor

Hamamelis spp.

Secale cereale spighe

Comarum palustre

Scripus spp.

Lupinus perennis Lycaeides melissa samuelis Sporobolus heterolepis

Liatris spicata

Cypripedium candidum

Arenaria interpres

Asclepias meadii

Aix sponsa

Vireo bellii

Grus canadensis

Calidris alba

Ardea herodias

Vermivora chrysoptera

Boltonia decurrens

Agastache nepetoides

Anas acuta

Cornus florida

Populus tremuloides Solidago canadensis

Lanius ludovicianus

Pinus strobus

Quercus alba/bicolor

Melanerpes erythrocephalus

Contopus cooperi

Rhus typhina

Cornell Lab of Ornithology, April 2014, http://www.allaboutbirds.org/ Oak Savannahs, April 2014, http://oaksavannas.org/ Checklist of Endangered and Threatened Animals and Plants of Illinois, April 2014, http://www.dnr.illinois.gov/espb/documents/etchecklist2011.pdf Mississippi Flyway Priority Birds, April 2014, http://conservation.audubon.org/mississippi-flyway-priority-birds Migration Pathways, April 2014, http://www.birds.cornell.edu/AllAboutBirds/studying/migration/pathways

Cornell Lab of Ornithology, April 2014, http://www.allaboutbirds.org/ http://www.birds.cornell.edu/AllAboutBirds/studying/migration/pathways Mississippi Flyway Priority Birds, April 2014, http://conservation.audubon.org/mississippi-flyway-priority-birds

This diagram above shows the key species I identified conducting research on the Mississippi flyway.

It shows the density of migration, which months are the most prolific, and when choosing the plant species for the project, the bird species were considered.