John Whitaker is a registered architect and landscape designer with over 15 years of experience in award-winning projects with unique sensitivities to site, environment and community. Invested in the synthesis between architecture and proximate landscapes, John strives to integrate designed places within wider ecological and cultural contexts. Working across disciplines and at multiple scales, his experience spans higher-education campuses, national parks, agricultural facilities, urban plazas, single-family residences and cemeteries. With bold and empathetic design solutions, John seeks to engage complex environmental challenges and address the interdependent nature of landscape and culture.

John earned a Bachelor of Architecture from Drury University’s Hammons School of Architecture in 2007 and a Master of Landscape Architecture from Washington University in Saint Louis (WUSTL) in 2021. He was nominated as WUSTL’s 2020 representative in the Landscape Architecture Foundation’s Olmsted Scholars Program which recognizes elite student leadership in landscape architecture. John’s academic landscape work has been internationally recognized with the 2020 and 2021 American Society of Landscape Architects’ (ASLA) Student Award of Excellence in General Design. His graduate thesis ‘Dark Matter’ received the National Student Award for Creative Scholarship from the Council of Educators in Landscape Architecture (CELA) and was published in Landscape Architecture Magazine and the Landscape Architecture Frontiers Journal. John’s independent architectural work has been selected for four Hammons School of Architecture Alumni Design Awards. He has taught graduate-level courses as a lecturer at the Sam Fox School of Design and Visual Arts at Washington University in Saint Louis and led drawing and digital representation workshops with students at WUSTL, Drury University, and Auburn University.

John grew up on a farm in the Missouri Ozark Highlands where his formative years were spent exploring the region's oak-hickory forests, igneous glades, and 'gin-clear' spring-fed streams. This rural upbringing informs his passion for projects that expand equitable public space while rehabilitating and preserving ecological systems in urban and rural locales. Throughout his career, John has engaged in independent research, travel, and hands-on exploration of material and method in pursuit of producing work that exemplifies the highest standards of craft, environmental stewardship and concept-driven design.

John lives with his family near the Salish Sea on the Kitsap Peninsula.  

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