Kalamazoo, MI - Landscape Forms, North America’s leading designer and manufacturer of site furniture, has announced that Efrain E. Velez AIA, IDSA, LEED A.P. has been appointed to the Product Design Team as Senior Designer. Mr. Velez is a registered architect and product designer with a broad range of experience in the United States and abroad. His professional experience includes large, complex buildings and award winning product and furniture design for medical, hospitality, education and hi-tech industries.
Mr. Velez’s academic credentials include a Bachelors in Fine Arts in Design and Masters of Architecture from The University of Texas at Austin, a Masters in Industrial Design from the Scuola Politecnica di Design in Milan, Italy and a series of practical internships in Painting, Graphic Design, Industrial Design, Architecture and Real Estate Development in the United States, the Caribbean, Italy, Spain, Mexico and France.
Prior to joining Landscape Forms, Mr. Velez served as Project Architect and Lead Designer at the Sunland Group and HDR Architecture teams in Austin, Texas. He also completed professional practice requirements while at school at the Renzo Piano Building Workshop in Paris, France. Adding to Landscape Forms’ International vocabulary, Mr. Velez is fluent in Spanish, English, Italian and conversational French. He was recently a guest speaker in the “Art + Architecture” series at the Austin Museum of Art as one of that city’s emerging Design voices. His work has been published, awarded and exhibited in venues such as the Salone del Mobile in Milan, Italy; the De Padova showroom, also in Milan; NeoCon in Chicago; the AIA National Convention in San Francisco and the International Contemporary Furniture Fair (ICFF) in New York.
The Landscape Forms Product Design Team is led by Arno Yurk IDSA, Vice President of Design, who has been integrally involved in the company’s product design and development for 25 years. Brian Revoir IDSA, joined the company in 2010 as a Senior Designer, bringing to the team eleven years of product design experience with Michael Graves Design Group. Landscape Forms has experienced significant growth over the past decade and a half. With the addition of Mr. Velez, this further expansion of the design team is another milestone for the company. Arno Yurk explains, “We are continually collaborating with internationally renowned designers from a variety of disciplines to create a stream of new site furnishings and lighting products. Expanding our internal design team increases our capacity to bring these exciting new concepts to market.”
About Landscape Forms
Since its founding in 1969 Landscape Forms has earned a reputation for excellent design, high quality products and exceptional service. The Landscape Forms U.S. headquarters and manufacturing facility is located in Kalamazoo, Michigan with sales offices throughout North America, the United Kingdom, Southern Europe, the United Arab Emirates and Asia. Landscape Forms collaborates with renowned industrial designers and consultancies, landscape architects and architects to design and develop integrated collections of products that address emerging needs and help create a sense of place. The company has an installed base of products around the world. Clients include municipalities, transit centers, corporate, college and health care campuses; and familiar brand leaders such as Boeing, Cisco Systems, Disney, Sprint, American Airlines, Herman Miller and Nike. Landscape Forms was recently named by the Wall Street Journal as one of the Top 15 Small Workplaces in the US. www.landscapeforms.com
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