SEYYADA BURNEY | PORTFOLIO

Urban Sites Studio |Winter- Spring 2021

UWLA Honors Award 2020-21

The ‘South Delridge Resiliency Coalition’ (SDRC) is a speculative collection of new and existing organizations that directs implementation of the Green New Deal priniciples of Jobs and Justice.

The SDRC centers the power of local coalitions to operationalize and inform federal policies. It is the spatial manifestation of a wider, paradigm shift central to environmental justice: empowering communities to unite behind their watersheds reveals strength in the interstitial spaces that our shared resources bring together

Media: Pen, Trace, QGIS, Rhino, Illustrator, Photoshop, InDesign, AfterEffects.

Designers: S. Burney, Z. McBride, J. Sleamaker, F. Perez

Collaborative Partner: Mithun

Nationwide Network of Resiliency Coalitions

Programmatic Interventions Affect Political-Economic Permability

RESEARCH EDUCATION COMMUNITY OWNERSHIP

Credit: Burney, McBride, Perez, Sleamaker

Credit: Burney, McBride, Perez, Sleamaker

South Delridge: Context

Sacred Waters Living Center

ROXBURY BOG

Physical Interventions Improve Site Permability and Reduce Stormwater Runoff

Hand

Machine Plant Agent Water

SOUTH DELRIDGE RESILIENCY COALITION | 2

Credit: Burney, McBride, Perez, Sleamaker

Site Analysis

Phase 1

GSI Retrofit

School Garden + Natural Playground

Flexible open space

Phase 2 Plant Nursery Pop-Up Markets

Phase 3

GSI Retrofit

GSI Retrofit

Flexible open space

Floodable Rain Garden

Community Owned Housing

Pop-Up Markets Community Land

Yousef is a local resident and student at nearby Hope Academy. He attends the new SDRC after-school gardening program at Holy Family Bilingual School, where he learns to store and use rainwater to grow fresh food with local elders, like Minh.

Yousef helps Minh record and report weekly garden progress for ongoing remediation efforts.

Hermine graduated from highschool last year. Her science program helped her find a summer job as an educator and research assistant at the Civic Stormwater Lab.

Hermine shows Yousef, now a freshman, how to record his observation of a Short Billed Dowitcher. He's contributing to data that scientists will use to study ecosystem functioning in the bog.

Miguel is a sculptor in residence at the Civic Stormwater Lab. He met Hermine there, who now works on the ecological research team. When they get off work they love to go together to the SDRC Evening Market.

Next month, they'll be some of the first residents to move into the new housing built by the Sacred Waters Community Land Trust.

In Phase 1 of the Sacred Waters development, community members activate an asphalt playground with tactical surface painting. Planter box gardens and tree plantings provide proof of concept for longer term investments in a education and stormwater management strategies such as a school garden, natural playground, and new shade trees.

Applied Research Consortium Fellowship | 2021-2022

Plant nurseries are important partners in the creation of vibrant and ecologically diverse landscapes. Retail nurseries and garden centers are also sites of publicplant interactions. How can contemporary design practice mobilize these relationships for good? How can we work together to advance social and spatial justice?

This research project investigated plant propagation practices at seven plant nurseries. Findings were synthesized in a tabletop game that recreates the dynamics of the modern nursery industry and encourages players to play-out the impacts of operational decisions and different social and spatial justice iniatiatives. Game testing and play demonstrate this medium’s efficacy at facilitating dialogue about more just plant production and sourcing strategies.

Evaluative criteria based on dimensions of justice and plant nursery’s relative agency and influence

Media: Photos, Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, + InDesign

Case Study Findings

Monrovia Nursery Company

Monrovia Nursery Company Citywide Horticulture Citywide Horticulture

Heronswood Botanic Garden

Heronswood Botanic Garden Oxbow Farm + Conservation Center Oxbow Farm + Conservation Center

Ploughshares Nursery

Ploughshares Nursery

Tabletop Game Analysis and Design Framework - Report Extracts

Mechanisms + Rules

((1) Galaxy is set up by shuffling and arranging 12 planet cards in three rows of four. Each planet card has an associated number.

DESIGNER/S: BRIAN VAN SLYKE

THEME SCIENCE FICTION / POLITICAL SATIRE

4.2.6 SPACE CATS FIGHT FASCISM (6) Resist Cards: Players may hold up to four resist cards at time. Each card has one of four effects, a. + Liberation b. -1 or -2 Fascists c. Heal 1 or Heal 2 (removes scratches from a cat) d. Teleport (move to any planet)

GAME TYPE: AREA INFLUENCE

PLAYERS: 2-4

PLAYER INTERACTION COOPERATIVE

Scenario

Players are rebel cats who work together to liberate a fictional galaxy of planets from fascist rat rule.

(2) Players determine level of difficulty using Fascism scale – easier games will start with two dice and a lower score, and more difficult games with three dice and a higher starting score. Events throughout the game will either increase or decrease the fascism scale.

(3) Cats: Each player chooses a character to play. Each cat has a ‘home planet’ and unique abilities that multiple the impact of specific cards or moves. Cats get ‘scratched’ each time fascists are added to their current planet or because of particular events.

(4) Tokens: Occupation and Liberation are represented in Blue (Fascist) or Orange (Rebel) tokens. At the start of the game, one fascist token is placed on each player’s home planet and on each

Most resist cards apply to a cat’s current planet. Some have space-limited abilities, indicated by symbols. These can only be played on matching planets.

(7) Dice: Players roll 1-3 dice at the end of their turn depending on collective fascism scale score and whether they have removed fascist tokens from the board during their turn. E.g if they remove fascist, they roll one less die. Players must roll at least one die at the end of their turn.

(8) Planets 9-12 are ‘Fascist Strongholds’. Each

Boards are two-dimensional play surfaces. They can be individual or shared among all players, and fixed or re-configurable. Boards typically represent space and/or capacity, but can also represent the passage of time. Boards often dictate which options players will encounter and choose between during the game.

EXAMPLE APPLICATION

All players follow the same path or circuit. Individual outcomes or pace of movement along path/circuit typically determined by chance mechanism(s) (See Section 5.3.5)

Tiles typically represent spatial features; feature distribution depends on tile arrangement and changes each session. Players may compete actively for feature ownership and/or points

Tiles represent spatial features and could be arranged during game set up or play. Players strategize movements and actions and earn points together.

Boards represent impacts of individual player resources and actions only. Players compete passively to earn points throughout game.

Monopoly, Game of Life

Carcassonne

SpaceCatsFightFascism

Wingspan, Century:SpiceRoad

Game play involves navigating nursery establishment and growth. A central board and path asks all players to make decisions at critical junctures, e.g. whether or not to invest in additional propagation facilities at Year 5.

Game play involves expanding influence across a given space, e.g. nurseries competing for contracts spread across the city, or plants/ pests competing for dominance over an area.

Plant nursery workers work together to manage the spread of plant pests and diseases in a large commercial nursery.

Players represent different plant nurseries who cultivate plants and run programs during the course of the game.

How much would you like game progression or outcomes to vary between play sessions? Tiles are more flexible than fixed boards.

What is a bigger determinant of progress within the cultivation context in question, space or time?

What are you more interested in exploring, spatial relationships and/or progression over time?

Figure 41. SpaceCatsFightFascism Mechanisms and Rules

Version2.5 SETUP AS A GROUP: 1. Determine where on the board allplayerswillstart.Whichseason,equinox,orsolsticemakessenseasthestartofyouryear?

2. Discussavailableprogramcardsandselect6-12toplaywith.Placeselectedcards onthespacesmarked‘PROGRAM’(seebelowformoreinfo)

3. ShuffleandplaceActionand Eventcarddecksintheirrespectivespacesonthe board.

4. Placeshuffledplantcarddeckinthecenteroftheboard.Flipthreecardsinfo-side

5. Shuffleandplaceordercarddeckwithinreachofallplayers(seebelowforhowto adjustfordifficultylevel)

6. Dealeachplayerthree plantcards andoneresourcetokenofeachtypetostart.

7. Decidewhowillgofirst(e.g.highestroll,visitednurserymostrecently…)andstartto

twoplantsandtworesourcetokens,orthreeplantsandoneresourcetoken

BASIC GAME PLAY

20 victorypointswins!

Playersareplantnurseryownerscompetingtogrowplants,fulfillorders,andearnvictory points.Taketurnsrollingthenumbereddieandmovingtheindicatednumberofspaces aroundtheboard.Takeactionsorearnbenefitsbasedonthespacesyoulandon.The first

TypeofPlay Description

Individual, Collaborative

TournamentStyle, Competitive

Playinteamsoftwo,withtwogrow bedsperteamandanextrabuddy todiscussgamestrategieswith.

Setupmultiplecopiesofthegame. Eachgame’splayerscooperate witheachothertoearnvictory points,andcompetewiththeother gamefortotalpoints

PotentialAdaptation

Teammustearn30victory pointstowin

Youarewelcometoadaptgamerulesandgoals.Forexample,youmaywanttoadjustthe numberofvictorypointsrequiredtowinbasedonhowyouareplayingthegame:

Teamsmustearn40victory pointstowin

Design Foundations Studio | Fall 2020

UWLA Honors Award 2020-21

‘Material Signatures’ reveals, enhances, and manipulates spatial experiences along a pedestrian trajectory through Seward Park. Gabions take inspiration from existing material thresholds along this path and reference the multiple histories of this site: Indigenous, White settler, and contemporary managment as a ‘public’ park. Material shoals transform over time, prompting visitors to compare the environmental legacies of human habitation and land use patterns.

Media: Pencil, Charcoal, Pen, Watercolor, Illustrator, Photoshop, + InDesign

Site Location And Historical Context(s)

Material Interventions evolve over Time

Sand + Ice

Seward Park

Site Context

Environmental Histories

Willow Stakes Stone

GARRY OAK STAND

CLARKS PRAIRIE

AUDOBON CENTER

Advanced Studio: Furnishing the Landscape + Materials, Crafts, and Construction | Fall 2021

This bench is an exploration of curves and materials. It takes inspiration from a curving path in a residential garden, and is designed around the tectonic assembly of boardform concrete and ash. Iterations on the original curve are represented through process sketches and conceptual and scale models. Assembly details were resolved 2D and 3D modeling. Fabrication was completed in 4 weeks.

Media: Cardboard, Papier mache, AutoCAD, Rhino, Concrete + Ash

Isometric Assembly Diagram

Landscape Performance

Thermory’s timber modification improves the strength and rot resistance of non-tropical hardwoods- improving their applicability for exterior applications and reducing environmental impacts and carbon footprint of tropical hardwood logging and transport.

Sources: www.thermoryusa.com; National Pesticide Information Center; Zimmerman (2015: 53-63)

Thermory wood is shipped by water from supplier- this is 2X as fuel-efficient as freight trains and 10X as fuel efficient as 18-wheeler trucks

Source: www.thermoryusa.com

This bench provides outdoor seating, facilitating views of nature - these can lower cortisol levels (an objective indicator of stress) among users as much as 40%, compared to those without views of nature and vegetation.

Source: LAF Fast Facts Library

compacted

18-8 Round-head, hex drive steel screws

18-8 Steel washer

18-8 Flat-head hex drive screws threaded through pre-drilled holes and attached to coupling bolt in concrete base

Stack 18-8 Steel washers as spacers between wood seat and concrete base

Existing subgrade

Thermory ash seat back and base

Reinforced boardform concrete base is cast-in-place and angled to 104 degrees from ground planethis is a comfortable position for longer sitting

aggregate sub-base

Site Analysis and Historical Context

1920 | Port of Bellingham established

1960s | Native communities engage in non-violent activism, or ‘Fish-Ins’, to reclaim their fishing rights.

9000 BC | Lummi, Nooksack, and other Coast Salish peoples steward fishing village and ecocsystems around ‘What-coom’ Creek.

1855

1926 | Puget Sound Pulp and Timber company builds tissue mill on waterfront.

1972- Passage of the Clean Water Act mandates Georgia-Pacific treat effluent water before discharging it into the Bay.

SCAN Design Studio | Fall 2022

The Bellingham waterfront bears witness to decades of industrial progress at the cost of coastal environments. This proposal re-envisions this site as a symbiotic eco-district where green industry not only thrives alongside rehabilitating nearshore environments, it strengthens vital connections between land, water, and people. It takes inspiration from the function and form of a woodworking spline. It affects climate resilience through circularity, local job and wealth creation, nearshore rehabilitation, and in-situ soil remediation, while revitalizing Bellingham’s maritime industries.

Media: QGIS, Rhino, Illustrator, Photoshop Designers: S. Burney, L. Corn, Y. Khor, A, Maifeld-Carucci

1900 | Industrial and municipal waste piles create new fill-land on Bellingham Bay mudflats.

1904 | Lower Whatcom creek and estuary are dredged to create deep waterway for shipping

1940s | Puget Sound Pulp and Timber company expands into alcohol manufacture. Timber bi-product chemicals research supports entry into bleached pulp products.

1947 | Georgia-Pacific purchases plywood mill in Bellingham.

1960s-Port in-fills additional six acres of land to expand shipping area.

1963-Georgia-Pacific purchases Puget Sound Pulp and Timber Company.

1967-71-Georgia-Pacific dumps mercury from chlor-alkali pulp-bleaching operations into the Whatcom waterway.

1974 - Boldt Decision grants tribes rights to 50% of harvestable fish catch from ‘usual and accustomed’ fishing grounds.

1991- Georgia-Pacific experiences net losses of $151 million.

2000s- Georgia-Pacific closure coincides with downsizing of Intalco Aluminum Plant operations in Ferndale, severely decreasing activity at Bellingham Shipping Terminal

2005- Port of Bellingham acquires former Georgia-Pacific site in exchange for clean-up and remediation by the WA Dept. of Ecology.

1750-1852 | Coal, timber, and gold rush-led settlement

| Treaty of Point Elliot.

The Tide Garden is a connected water treatment and habitat restoration system where industrial wastes support life, and where ‘green’ is about being blue.

Dry docks typically discharge water - and water-borne chemicals and hydrocarbons - directly into adjacent water bodies. Instead, ours cycles and treats water in subsurface wetland cells. Treated brackish water is periodically released into the tide garden, where it combines with tidal fluctuations to create complex network of sediments and habitat.

Gabions filled with locally-sourced ‘waste’ oyster shlls give initial form to this garden, but are subsumed by the shifting sands and waters over time, transforming a once contaminated log pond into a rehabilitated tide flat where humans and non-humans can thrive again - and together.

Ships from across the Pacific will dry dock here to get retrofitted for electric engines

Effluentfromdry

Locally sourced oyster-shells filter heavy metals, slow sediment drift, and create microhabitats inside tide garden gabions

Wetland plants and microalgae bioaccumluate hydrocarbons and heavy metals.

Waterreleasedintosubsurface wetlandcells.

Surface runoff from site adds fresh water to wetland cells

Biochar produced on site improve water treatment and carbon sequestration in wetland cells

dockispumpedintounderground cistern.

Freshwaterfrompurplepipeonsitemoderatessalinity levelsduringdry months

SUBSURFACE WETLAND CELLS

TIDE GARDEN

DRY DOCK

Lined concrete cells hold gravel and bioaccumulator wetland plants. Plants uptake organic nutrients in effluent and stormwater while microalgae and bacteria help break down chemicals. Biochar further supports water treatment and carbon sequestration.

Gabions filled with locally sourced waste oyster shells create shallower and more varied shoreline. Some grid spaces contain sand and others are left open. Treated water flows and tidal fluctuations transform this grid into more organic channels and islands over time.

Treated, brackish water is released into tide garden, where oyster-shell filled gabions create a network of channels and habitat. Saturated sediments and eelgrass beds sequester ocean-borne carbon.

Brackish water flows and tidal fluctuation create a complex network of channels and islands over time. Community members help stabilize sediments and build habitat by periodically planting these areas with nearshore vegetation, such as eelgrass.

Julia is a Lummi

Their research and monitoring supports tribal-led nearshore restoration efforts around the country.

Phase Three

ecologist and a researcher at Western Washington University, She runs the Tide Garden Project, a collective that centers tribal leadership in the creation and management of rehabilitated mud flats in this area.

Materials, Craft, and Construction | Fall 2021

Typical and innovative material assemblies documented using AutoCAD and analyzed in 2D and 3D using Rhinocerous, Photoshop, and Illustrator. Landscape performance information sourced from LAF Fast Fact Library and Benefits Toolkit

Media: AutoCAD, Rhino, Illustrator, Photoshop

PRECIP. IS UNABLE TO PERMEATE INTO GROUND SURFACE. RUNOFF FLOWS ACROSS SURFACE AS SHEET FLOW, PICKING UP POLLUTANTS, SUCH AS PCBS. POROUS ASPHALT HAS A RUNOFF COEFFICIENT OF ALMOST ZERO THIS MEANS THAT ALMOST ALL THE WATER THAT FALLS ON THIS SURFACE IS ABLE TO PERMEATE INTO THE GROUND.

SOURCE: METROPOLITAN AREA PLANNING COUNCIL

RUNOFF IS MECHANICALLY FILTERED THROUGH THE PORE SPACES OF PERMABLE SUBLAYERS.

RUNOFF IS ABLE TO FLOW THORUGH SUBGRADE AND RECHARGE SURROUNDING AREAS

PRECIPITATION FLOWS OFF IMPERMEABLE SURFACES AND INTO STORM DRAINS OR WATER BODIES. RUNOFF IS OFTEN CONTAMINATED WITH POLLUTANTS, SUCH AS TOXIC COMPOUNDS AND DEBRIS.

PERMEABLE PAVERS ALLOW PRECIPITATION TO INFILTRATE INTO GROUND LAYERS. PERMEABLE JOINTS AND SUBGRADES WITH 10-20% VOID SPACES CAN REDUCE SURFACE RUNOFF BY 70-80%.

SOURCE: METROPOLITAN AREA PLANNING COUNCIL WHEN COMBINED WITH SILVA CELLS, PERMEABLE PAVERS ALLOW STORMWATER TO BE RECYLCED FOR TREE IRRIGATION. THIS PROVIDES JOINT BENEFITS BY REDUCING WATER USED FOR IRRIGATION AND STORMWATER RUNOFF REACHING STORM DRAIN SYSTEMS.

CONVENTIONAL STAIRS AND RAILINGS TYPICALLY SUPPORT LIMITED OR SINGLE FUNCTIONS: USE AS GRADE NAVIGATION DEVICES.

INTEGRATING SEATING ELEMENTS INTO STAIRS CREATES MULTIFUNCTIONAL OPEN SPACES OUT OF GRADE CHANGES IN THE LANDSCAPE. THIS MAKES IT POSSIBLE FOR MORE DIVERSE SOCIAL ACTIVITIES IN THE SAME SPACE, INCREASING THE NUMBER OF POTENTIAL USERS AND THE POSSIBILITIES FOR URBAN SOCIOBILITY.

PUBLIC SEATING WAS ONE OF THE STRONGEST DETERMINANTS OF VARIANCE IN INCIDENCES OF SOCIAL BEHAVIOR BETWEEN THREE CITY BLOCKS IN A STUDY CONDUCTED IN MASSACHUSETTS.

SEATING HAD A 0.78 CORRELATION WITH HIGHER LIVELINESS INDEX SCORES, INDICATING THAT IT HAD A SIGNIFICANT POSITIVE IMPACT ON PERCEPTIONS OF ‘LIVELINESS’ AMONG SURVEYED RESPONDENTS.

CONVENTIONAL STOMWATER MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES CAPTURE AND REMOVE STORMWATER (AND ANY POLLUTANTS) OFFSITE. THESE SYSTEMS ARE MORE COSTLY TO MAINTAIN, AND PRIORITIZE HUMAN USES OF TURF SPACES.

BIOINFILTRATION RAIN GARDENS REMOVE POLLUTANTS FROM STORMWATER - MEDIAN ORTHOPHOSPHATE CONCENTRATIONS CAN DECREASE AS MUCH AS 88% IN PONDED WATER IN THE PORE SPACES AT THE BOTTOM OF THE INFILTRATION BED

BIOINFILTRATION RAIN GARDENS TREAT AND MANAGE STORMWATER ON SITE- MEDIAN ORTHOPHOSPHATE CONCENTRATIONS CAN DECREASE AS MUCH AS 88% IN PONDED WATER.

ON-SITE AND DAYLIGHT STORMWATER MANAGEMENT ENABLES MULTIPLE BENEFITS - AQUATIC PLANTS AND RAIN GARDEN SOIL MIXES FILTER WATER, AND BOTH TREATED WATER AND AQUATIC PLANTS SERVE AS HABITAT FOR LOCAL FLORA AND FAUNA.

SOURCE: SITE PHOTO (11/2/21)

SOURCE: BELARDE CO.

SOURCE: LRE GROUND SERVICES

SOURCE: VA SOIL & WATER CONSERVATION DISTRICT

Landscape designer with extensive research skills and passion for spatial justice. I care deeply about place-keeping and representation in design, and aspire to support community-driven public space design through relational landscape practice.

seyyadaburney@gmail.com

www.linkedin.com/in/seyyada

2013: B.A. in Geography

Mount Holyoke College, MA

2014: MPhil Sociology

Univ. of Cambridge, UK

2015-16: Lecturer

National Univ. of Science + Technology, Pakistan

2017-18: Americorps

International Rescue Committee, Seattle

2019: Landscape Horticulture

South Seattle College

2020: Landscape Design Associate

Aron Nussbaum Studio, CA

2020-23: Masters of Landscape Architecture

Univ. of Washington (UW)

2021: Community Planning Intern

City of Seattle - OPCD

2021-22: Applied Research Consortium Intern

GGN + UW

2022: Landscape Architecture Intern

Mithun - Seattle

LAF Olmsted Scholar | 2023 ASLA Honors | 2023