RACHEL LINDSAY BIO
As Head of Site Design at Regenerative Design Group, Rachel works principally with organizations and homeowners to create productive, resilient landscapes. She draws from her experiences in organic farming, Latin-American sustainable development, and art to approach design with cultural sensitivity and environmental integrity. Rachel approaches projects of all scales through a soil, carbon, and water conservation lens, looking for opportunities to reduce the environmental impact of design installation while meeting the client’s goals and aesthetic preferences. Her projects encourage people to engage deeply with their local ecosystems and apply holistic and low-stress approaches toward gardening and landscaping. A worker-owner at RDG, Rachel was a member of the steering committee that led the ownership transition process and has been the Treasurer of the Board of Directors since its establishment in 2022.
She holds an MS in Ecological Design from The Conway School and a BA in Anthropology from Wesleyan University. When she isn’t working, she may be found messing around in her garden, cooking with the latest harvest, or hiking with her husband and young daughter.
Learn more about Rachel at Regenerative Design Group.
SHOW NOTES
How gardening with parents and grandparents shaped Rachel's passion for plants
Taking a non-direct route to landscape design, starting with an anthropology degree
Starting a student-led farm during college and the connection between food production, culture, society, and environmental impact
Deciding to become a farmer after college and assistant managing a farm
The challenges of farming including the limited impact on changing how others think and the physical toll on the body
Discovering the Conway School for Landscape Design and realizing landscape design can marry culture, society, environmental science, and food production
Finding Regenerative Design Group through graduate school where two founding members were professors at Conway School
Connecting with their holistic approach to design and setting a high bar with regenerative practices
The evolution of Regenerative Design Group from an LLC to a worker-owned cooperative after 10 years
How a worker-owned cooperative operates with 13 members who are all co-owners with one share each and equal voting rights
Core principles of regenerative design from pushing toward reducing scope 3 emissions, embracing curiosity, and closing cycles
Unlearning the focus on the end product and the amazement that soil tests aren’t done until after the design is done
Using permaculture as a principle in land management and landscape design
Working on projects that include residential landscapes, site design, food systems planning, and large-scale agricultural and conservation projects
The importance of starting design projects with observation and understanding existing conditions and how to learn to read the land
Core principles of design including zones of accessibility, childhood plants, and integrated edibles
Strategies to improve disturbed soils
Not having a cookie cutter approach to design projects
The company's focus on ecological design, regenerative agriculture, and climate change work and the desire for cross pollination
Ways that projects fail
Reflections on five years of perspective
Rachel’s design process and the technology she uses for design
Inspired by Rebecca McMackin
What’s exciting Rachel right now
Reading The Botany of Desire which brought together agriculture, food, anthropology, society, and history
The joy of having a profession filled with constant learning and identifying plants and animals with kids
Propagating more plant love with diversity and engaging what people love and helping people find their own sparks of connection to the natural world
Learn more about Rachel at Regenerative Design Group.
