top of page
people
Christopher Fannin :: Senior Principal / Managing Director
Chris is an accomplished urban designer, master planner and landscape architect with a career that spans over 25 years, on projects throughout the globe as well as teaching at leading U.S. and U.K universities. Chris drives the creative vision of InSite, leveraging both the talent within his team as well as the KEO family of disciplines. Chris has a passion for investigating environments from multiple viewpoints and working collaboratively with design teams to bring these places alive for future generations. From large scale land use and master planning developments to intimate detail landscape designs, Chris and his team focus on bringing legible form to complex ecological, social and programmatic processes through elegant and sustainable designs. Before joining KEO, Chris worked for HOK in a series of senior positions globally, most recently as Senior Vice President and Global Director of Planning, as a member of the HOK’s Board of Directors as well as the Management Board.
John Rice :: Principal / Operations Director
John leads the InSite practice in Qatar and Kuwait and looks after the operations for the entire group. An experienced Landscape Architect with a proven track record in the successful delivery of large scale projects in Europe and the middle east, John has over 19 years' experience in design, project management and contract administration. He has handled design projects at all stages of work stages on a wide variety of project types including large and small scale developments residential, commercial, retail, mixed use, healthcare, streetscape, urban design, public realm, and landscape strategies for both horticulture and university schemes. John's design ethos is grounded in the development design solutions driven by the consideration of the genius loci, social, physical and historical context of a site rendered through the application of well-considered, tested and clever design solutions.
Salam Alkhori :: Principal / Planning
Salam is a Principal at KEO/InSite with 22+ years of master planning experience in the Middle East and Gulf regions. She heads the master planning practice at InSite, supervises planning projects and leads the urban design and planning studio. Her portfolio reflects a diverse and extensive range of experience across the MENA region. Her experience reflects leadership in delivery and implementation of mega projects in the UAE, KSA, Kuwait, Qatar and Oman.
Salam is a respected Principal, an inspiring Practice Leader and resilient Project Director who has a proven track record of successful developments in complex and challenging environments. Her outstanding performance as the leader of the planning studio can only be matched by her relentless passion to excel further and embrace new challenges. Salam’s principal position with InSite is evidence of the confidence we place in her.
Richard Simpson-Pudney :: Principal / Landscape
Richard leads the Dubai studio for InSite. A Chartered Landscape Architect with more than seventeen years of experience, Richard has worked on key projects in a range of countries including the UK, Spain, New Zealand, India, UAE, Oman, Qatar, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Cyprus, Albania and Syria. The projects which he has been involved in encompass residential, commercial, educational, mixed use, retail, aviation, hospitality and leisure developments. Within the Dubai design studio, Richard is the team leader as key designer and project manager, driving the creation of multiple landscapes at every scale. Richard is in charge of the design and delivery of all work for Emaar, with whom Insite are heavily engaged for the Dubai Hills Estate project.
Alistair Russell :: Principal / Senior Project Lead
Alistair is a member of the Chartered Institute for Horticulture and has over 28 years of experience working on projects in UK, Indonesia, Malaysia, Hong Kong, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Iraq. This experience has taken him through a diverse range of projects from mixed use, residential, zoo and parks, educational, golf courses and hotels as well as numerous leisure focused projects. He is involved as the senior project manager and design coordinator on our most complex projects responsible for interdisciplinary coordination as well as being client facing. Alistair’s extensive knowledge of construction and construction supervision ensures that our projects are implemented properly through the construction phase, achieving the original design intent and the project’s vision as developed in conjunction with the client. At present, he is predominantly involved in KSA with new exciting giga projects for hospitality and public realm.
Chris Smeaton :: Associate Principal / Information Modelling
With 16 years of experience in planning and landscaping architecture in the UK, Middle East and Southeast Asia, Chris has created, managed and realized numerous large-scale developments. His prototypical knowledge of BIM implementation systems imbues within him exceptional judgement and discernment for the industry's most ambitious projects. Chris leads InSite's development of technical innovations, research, analysis, and systematizing cutting-edge solutions in order to leverage the benefits of BIM to most efficiently realize a project's vision. Being an early champion of the use of BIM in the realm of landscape design, he has made key breakthroughs in effectively delivering the profound benefits that Building Information Modelling and Management afford construction process. Accordingly, he has won international BIM competitions such as the Build Sydney and Build Qatar Live, which his team received the Construction of Excellence Award for Innovation in Design.
Rowena West :: Senior Consultant Landscape Architect
With over 20 years’ experience in the industry Rowena is a Landscape Architect and Project Manager who combines her technical knowledge and organizational skills alongside her creativity and design ability. Rowena is a highly motivated, dedicated and organised individual with a breadth of cultural and international experience having worked in the UK, USA, India, Malta and the Middle East. Always up for a challenge, Rowena thrives in creating efficiencies in team working and project delivery to achieve successful end results, be that a built project, a strategy document or concept design. Her key roles and responsibilities have included managing large design teams, client and multi-disciplinary consultant liaison, report writing and creation, managing project budgets and programmes, as well as designing a wide range of project types, from resorts to residential developments to equestrian facilities. Her passion is people and team work; a strong advocate of mentoring and developing skills of individuals to become strong team players.
Christopher Neiner :: Associate Principal Environmental Graphics
In his 14 year career he has focused on Environment/Experience graphic design in the form of wayfinding for systems on ranging from high-rise office towers, city parks, and universities to mega-project master plans and development guidelines. In addition to wayfinding programming, Chris has worked in User Experience and design research with regard to graphic interfaces. He began his career at in the US at EDSA where it was instilled the power of bespoke site-tailored design. Later, moving on to the design research company UserInsight, he learned to break down user’s functional needs within systems and how to address them through graphic design and interaction guidance. Chris came to the Middle East 7 years ago to start InSite’s Wayfinding Studio. In that time he has brought countless wayfinding projects of all sizes from concept to realization as well as overseeing the advancement of InSite’s graphic capabilities of its products.
Noor Khalek :: Senior Associate Landscape Architect
Noor is a chartered Landscape Architect and leads the Abu Dhabi landscape studio for Insite . Noor has over 14 years of international experience with 12 years working in the Middle East region. Noor has extensive experience in large mixed- use master planning, urban design, landscape architecture, landscape construction, environmental design as well as specialized sustainable public realm development. Noor is responsible for preparing creative design solutions and developing projects with both private and government clients in order to successfully deliver projects from conceptual design, schematic design, detail design, tender documentation through to construction stage. Noor has an exquisite attention to detail, sensitivity to scale in addition to strong capabilities to evaluate and develop sustainable and practical design solutions.
Milica Blazincic :: Associate Landscape Architect
Milica is a qualified landscape architect with over nine years’ experience gained in Gulf. During that period, she has worked primarily on large scale projects, focusing on urbanism and landscape design. She is a very dedicated and team oriented professional with tremendous drive and work ethic. Her role involves leading projects in the Doha studio of InSite and collaborating on a wide spectrum of projects across our practice including public parks, commercial, mixed use, residential and leisure. Milica is curious about nature as well as a gifted puzzle solver with an innate ability to classify challenges as they arise and develop quick solutions to solve them as a team.
Mark Ferrer :: Associate Landscape Architect
Mark is a talented designer with over 14 years across South East Asia and the Middle East. He is involved in a wide range of projects including: The Dubai Hills Estate, several residential and hospitality projects for EMAAR in Dubai, the sprawling Al Bidda Park in Doha, a number of public parks in Abu Dhabi and a luxury residential neighborhood project in Oman. Located in our Abu Dhabi studio Mark works on projects across our entire practice. His illustrative design and technical skills enable him to communicate ideas to both our peers and our clients effectively and efficiently. Mark serves as a role model and key mentor for many of our junior staff in his understanding of the optimal way to design, represent and construct landscapes.
Tarek Al Sheeti :: Irrigation Design Manager
There is no one more passionate about irrigation than Tarek. He leads InSite’s irrigation team and is considered one of the finest irrigation designers in the region and has been involved with the development of industry standard software for irrigation. With over 15 years of experience since starting his career as a trainee for a landscape contractor during his university study, he designs systems from his understanding of the project brief as well as his comprehensive experience. Tarek works with landscape contractors, irrigation equipment suppliers, internationally recognized consultancies and publishes articles regularly.
Dana Al Haron :: Senior Associate Horticultural Specialist
Dana is ardent about using her fluency in plants to collaborate with design teams and clients in order to actualize their vision and give each project a clear unique identity and sense of place. With over twenty years’ experience in the Industry, she is a Horticulturalist who combines broad experience, artistic and creative flare to articulate wonderful landscape design packages, with a focus on planted form landscape that embodies fluidity and thoughtful expression. Dana has worked on projects of varying scales globally. These projects include hotels and resorts, palaces, residential estates, public parks, and a number of Golf Estates/developments. As a Designer, Senior Horticulturalist, and Sight Supervisor, her work has exposed her to all aspects of the field including; design, specification, procurement as well as implementation of landscapes. Dana also has experience with conceptualizing and developing specialized aspects of landscape master planning projects in addition to project environmental co-ordination and compliance to Local, European, and North American standards.
Shaajir Odantavida :: Senior BIM Coordinator
Shaajir is an experienced Landscape Designer with 17 years’ experience working in Middle East and India on major public realm developments, public/private parks, beaches, education schemes, hotels, resorts and marinas. He has a keen eye for detail, with an active role in our projects throughout all the stages of design process from Concept to Construction and has a proven track record of site supervision and contract administration successfully delivering projects on the ground from realisation of the original concept. Shaajir is enthusiastic about technological advances in our industry including BIM, modern construction methods and materials which are environmentally sound while offering best value for the project and society. He is highly proficient in time management, ability to work within the team, mentoring and always has an excellent understating of client our clients’ requirements.
Warren Keane :: Senior Associate Landscape Architect
Warren is a Professional Landscape Architect with 13 years’ experience in landscape design and construction, horticultural maintenance, and environmental management. He has a proven track record in the successful delivery of large-scale design and construction projects across Southern and Northern Africa, the Indian Ocean Islands, and the Arabian Gulf. Warren is particularly valued for his construction knowledge, having started his career in landscape construction and horticultural maintenance. This technical experience has been invaluable to his personal development as a project lead and has fine tuned his ability to refine details that contribute positively to the design integrity set out from the early stages of design. Warren demonstrates a strong diversity in his skillset and can be trusted with all aspects of design development through to post contract supervision and project handover. He has extensive experience in the hospitality sector, having designed and delivered several branded luxury resorts in the Middle East. His experience also includes mixed use and retail developments, residential, healthcare and education.
bottom of page