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 SUSTAINABILITY + WELLNESS         AND URBAN PLANNING

BOCA

RATON'S

2020

VISION

​

For this last remaining public vacant property along the Intracoastal waterfront adjacent to Downtown, Fitzsimons provided Conceptualization, Research, Programming, Planning, Presentations, Visioning sessions, Community Outreach, Advocacy and City Council Recommendations.  Design concepts sought to unify the Downtown with the Waterfront, and provide a dynamic outdoor space for residents and businesses to engage with the natural environment, encouraging walkability, sustainability, wellness and activity in this place of respite for the busy Downtown.  She founded 'Boca Raton's 2020 Vision', a community driven visionary leadership team to collaborate in shaping a 21st century vision for a flourishing Downtown, this new, urban waterfront park, its connection to a network of parks, plazas and walking streets, as well as arts, civic & other special public spaces throughout the City, and continues to collaborate with leaders and residents throughout the community.

PROJECT

The Downtown Waterfront & Downtown Masterplan Proposals

LOCATION

City of

Boca Raton, Florida

AMERICAN UNIVERSITY IN CAIRO

Fitzsimons collaborated with a team of architects, planners and engineers to plan a new college campus in an undeveloped desert area near Cairo to satisfy the growing needs of this educational institution.  Responsible for translating the University’s program into the campus design and developed space use strategies for all facilities. Provided test-fits, prototypical space plans, and advised on floor plate sizes, configurations and building square footages for buildings ranging from indoor/ outdoor classrooms, offices, library, student center, cafeteria, auditorium, and various support buildings. Collaborated on contextual design and integrated sustainable + welllness concepts through clustering buildings, zoning space, outdoor classrooms & responsible, local materials. (with RTKL)

PROJECT

Urban Planning, Sustainable Design, Integration of Building/Interiors

LOCATION

Cairo, Egypt

LA COUNTY MUSEUM

OF ART

In the conceptual urban plan and architectural design for LACMA's new contemporary wing, the design challenged the conventional museum box through the introduction of a biomorphic, spiraling building that strives to connect LACMA east and west with dynamic forms that unite interior and exterior spaces of the existing buildings, parking, and landscape elements. A series of overlapping layers reveal art along a rising internal path that becomes an experiential art journey. Solid walls rise to envelope the art and guide the viewer, while the roof canopies float above, admitting changing patterns of northern light through a filtered Low-E glass in the ceiling. Collectively these elements synchronize into an interdependent conchal system; both structural and environmentally responsive. (Thesis, conceptual)

PROJECT

Urban Plan & New Art Complex Design

LOCATION

Los Angeles, California

CHADWICK

SCHOOL

CAMPUS

This K-12 conceptual masterplan addressed a steep site built to full capacity atop the highest land elevation in the Palos Verdes Peninsula, fulfilling a challenge to add new buildings where little open space remained. With the intent to preserve open green space, Fitzsimons proposed buildings that cantilevered out over the steep down slope topography surrounding the site, carefully perched to minimize impact to the natural environment. The masterplan incorporated water retention ponds interconnected by cascading streams and an intertwining nature trail that unites the upper and lower campus. A new high school incorporated a planted roof top garden for science classes, and outdoor classrooms which terraced down the central courtyard of the V- shaped building, connecting students and staff to the surrounding landscape and Pacific Ocean beyond.

PROJECT

Urban Plan and New High School buildings

(Conceptual)

LOCATION

Palos Verdes, California