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Alumni Awards List

NEAL KESSLER graduated from Cape Elizabeth, Maine, high school. After taking classes with a local artist and developing an interest in plants, Neal stumbled onto the profession of landscape architecture and knew immediately it was what he wanted to do. A local landscape architect suggested to Neal that K-State had the best program in the nation, so Neal applied to K-State even though it was halfway across the continent in a place he had never seen! While a landscape architecture student at K-State, Neal was President and Vice President of the Student Chapter, ASLA; a member of Tau Sigma Delta Honor Society; named Outstanding Graduating Senior in Landscape Architecture; and received the ASLA Honor Award as a graduating fifth-year student.

Since his graduation in 1990 with the Bachelor of Landscape Architecture, Neal has been employed with SmithGroup JJR (formerly Johnson, Johnson & Roy and JJR Inc.) of Ann Arbor, Michigan. Though Neal had a number of job opportunities upon graduation, he chose JJR because of the variety of national scale projects, its award-winning history and a reputation for high-quality environmental design. Neal's current title at JJR is Associate/Senior Landscape Architect, and his responsibilities as a team leader range from conceptual planning to detailed design with an emphasis on college, university, and corporate campus master plans and detailed site design. Continuing the long history of graphic excellence at SmithGroup JJR, Neal is highly proficient at graphically communicating design ideas through the use of 3-dimensional sketches that allow his clients to immediately understand concepts.

Examples of Neal's projects include a master plan, site design, and implementation of the headquarters and visitor center for the FBI's Identification Division in Clarksburg, West Virginia; a master plan, site design and campus guidelines for the 4000 acre General Motors Proving Ground, the largest vehicle testing facility in the world; master plans and guidelines for the University of Connecticut campus, Storrs, Connecticut; the winning entry in the University of Michigan North Campus Design Competition to prepare a landscape master plan for the 980-acre North Campus, Ann Arbor, Michigan (received ASLA Merit Award); and design and implementation of major image pieces for the University of Michigan Stadium, including Champions Plaza, Varsity Plaza, and Wolverine Plaza, Ann Arbor, Michigan (received ASLA Honor Award). Crosswinds Marsh Interpretive Preserve, which involved preparation of a master plan for and implementation of an interpretive park in a 467-acre wetland mitigation site in Romulus, Michigan, received the 1999 ASLA President's Award of Excellence.

Neal is a licensed landscape architect in Michigan and Kansas, as well as a member of the American Society of Landscape Architects. He and his wife, Suzanne, are currently busy renovating the house and gardens they recently purchased in the Old West Side Historic District of Ann Arbor.