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Rayna deNiord

Principal

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Rayna is a Principal at CMG with 23 years of experience. She is interested in embracing natural systems to create resilient landscapes that support life for all beings. Embracing time as a partner, she is keenly aware of how season in the landscape and materiality in the built environment reveal change and use in a place – especially in the face of a changing climate.

For 12 years, Rayna led the design, construction, and ongoing care of Meta’s headquarters in Menlo Park. Through this experience, she gained valuable exposure and knowledge about how landscapes change over time – and how to reframe challenges as opportunities in maintaining them. Anticipating what might come next in the succession of both sensitive living systems and the durability of materials takes careful consideration and means paying attention to performance.

She is currently leading CMG’s largest and most high-profile university campuses, Triton Center – the new gateway and welcome center for students at the University of California San Diego, as well as the highly anticipated and long planned 27-acres College of the Desert in Palm Springs, CA. Rayna earned a Bachelor of Science in Landscape Architecture from Cornell University and joined CMG in 2004.

Awards

American Society of Landscape Architects Northern California Chapter - Award of Excellence - Facebook Bayfront Campus MPK20

American Society of Landscape Architects Professional Honor Award - General Design - Facebook Bayfront Campus MPK20

Selected Projects

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Meta Headquarters

campus

Situated in a rapidly evolving and liminal landscape, Meta Headquarters is a new contemporary workplace highlighting the importance of nature, culture, and place – bringing all aspects together to form a place for business. Over the last decade, the campus has evolved into a complex mosaic of social spaces, ecology, and infrastructure.
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Pacific Overlook

parks/public space

Previously a parking lot on a bluff, created by the dramatic collapse of the coastline, the forms of the new Pacific Overlook emerge from the ground like the remnants arrayed across the adjacent Sunken City ruins. The site transforms the southernmost tip of Los Angeles into a public open space and ocean overlook.
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SFMOMA Rooftop Garden

cultural

The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art held a design competition for a sculpture garden located on roof of the parking garage adjoining the museum. The winning scheme features an extension of the 5th floor gallery overlooking a serene and minimal sky garden, a pavilion cafe, bridge from the museum to the garden, and a lichen-covered wall that frames the rooftop gallery.
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University of California San Diego Triton Center

campus

Triton Center at the University of California San Diego creates a new, iconic gateway at the center of the expansive campus landscape. This vibrant, dense and urban open space establishes a strong sense of place and fosters connections between community and the broader environment. This redefined 10-acre site will serve as a vital anchor to ongoing UCSD campus expansion.