Our People
Creative, Resourceful & Professional, Stewards of the Environment.
Principals
Carter van Dyke, ASLA, AICP - Founder
Carter sees the world as a landscape that is interconnected to people; environmentally, economically and socially. His passion is finding ways to share his enthusiasm that ultimately engages the client and users into a meaningful relationship with the landscape around them. Since founding CVDA in 1984, Carter has led the firm's interdisciplinary team of planners and landscape architects in developing and preserving sustainable landscapes that speak to our heritage and tell a story about how we can embrace the landscape around us to create positive experiences. Amongst his passions is orchestrating exciting ways to move people through the landscape whether by automobile, bicycle or walking.
Carter has extensive experience as the principal-in-charge for leading multidisciplinary teams to develop a wide range of projects, including: downtown revitalization, master plans for public gardens, healing and therapeutic gardens, large-scale community and campus master plans and strategic master plans that shape community decisions toward sustainable design, and the landscape surrounding the home. Clients have often commented that Carter is a great listener and that he loves to laugh - especially at himself. He will often tug for the bigger vision, but not to create a larger project, rather to create the greater lasting value.
With a background in art history, he incorporates an unbelievable design sense and a drive to create the absolute best. He has a passion for the details. He has a Bachelors of Art from Rutgers University and a Master of Landscape Architecture from the University of Pennsylvania. Carter can often be seen riding around on his bicycle training for the annual MS City to Shore Tour. In addition, he and his wife travel frequently to visit their exchange students then bring back to the office new landscape architecture ideas. Contact: carter@cvda.com
Peter R Fernandez, RLA, ASLA - President
Peter has taken the lead on many of CVDA’s larger multi-disciplinary teams to develop a wide range of complex corporate, institutional, and government projects. His skills have given comfort that, even though we are by choice a small firm, he brings the technical skills to lead multi-disciplinary teams on projects that may be in the tens of millions of dollars. As a nationally licensed CLARB landscape architect, he also has international experience in parks, landscape architectural design, and installation.
His passion is horticulture with special skills in developing healing gardens, maintenance management, ecology and the restoration and preservation of native landscapes; all with a central focus to create healthy and sustainable landscapes. Most importantly, he is rooted in sound engineering principles that provide a strong and practical foundation for our projects. Peter has a Bachelor of Landscape Architecture from the College of Environmental Science and Forestry, the State University of New York and a Masters of Landscape Architecture from the University of Pennsylvania. He continues to serve on multiple non-profits that provide a lasting change in the community. He is probably happiest with a chainsaw grooming the forests at his land in the Finger Lakes region of New York State. Contact: peter@cvda.com
Landscape Designers & Architects
Lisa Roman
Lisa brings experience and proficiency in residential, commercial, institutional, and municipal planning and design. She is a highly skilled Landscape Designer, with extensive expertise in presentation graphics. She is a hands-on and resourceful researcher seeking new sources in sustainable design or new techniques, driven and compelled to achieve excellence at every step from identifying and understanding requirements and objectives, to creating, managing and implementing innovative solutions, to on-time project completion within budgetary constraints. She has a Bachelors of Landscape Architecture from Penn State University and a Certificate in Entrepreneurship and International Business Development, MIB School of Management, Trieste, Italy. When Lisa is not gardening, she may be sailing, or volunteering for a community event or activity. She is fluent in Italian. Contact: lisa@cvda.com
Lucinda Bartley
Lucinda joined CVDA in 2018. She is a detailed designer with a passion for ecological restoration and place-specific design, whether at the small or urban-planning scale. She brings a professional background in editing and publishing to a second career in landscape design and architecture, and finds landscapes and book manuscripts can be approached similarly through insightful analysis, empathetic communication with the client, and creative and critical problem-solving.
Before joining the landscape architecture field, Lucinda was a book editor in New York City, working for major publishers to acquire and develop smart, engaging nonfiction projects in science, journalism, history, and education.
She has a Master of Landscape Architecture degree from Temple University, where she focused on ecological restoration within landscape design. She was awarded the PA-DE ASLA Student Honor Award for her work in the graduate program. Her capstone project was a master plan for the historic Peter Wentz Farmstead in Worcester, Pennsylvania. She also led an editorial team in developing a PA-DE ASLA Merit Award-winning report for a healing landscape at the Fox Chase Cancer Center. She earned a Bachelor of Liberal Arts degree from the University of Texas at Austin, with majors in English, philosophy, and interdisciplinary liberal arts. Contact: lucinda@cvda.com
Steve Burger
Steve brings over 35 years of experience working as a landscape architect as part of large interdisciplinary engineering firms prior to working with CVDA. We are fortunate in that this has provided him with extensive experience in land planning, site design and permitting for a wide variety of land development projects. His work spans zoning analysis and project conception through to final construction plan documentation. He has helped guide his Clients projects through the municipal review and approval process, from schematic design review to final subdivision or land development approvals. Steve also has experience in completing permit applications for local Soil Conservation District as well as EPS applications for highway occupancy permits from PennDOT.
For the past 4 years with CVDA he has coordinated multiple sub-consultants to nurture complex projects through the permitting and approval stages. As a landscape architect he brings a broad design perspective that embraces practical solutions that ensure sustainable results that add a lasting value to the project. Steve is a graduate from Penn State University with a B.S. and a BLA, with honors. He is a registered landscape architect in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and a member of the American Society of Landscape Architects. Steve drives around in his zombie mobile, keeping our neighborhoods safe, a civic duty he felt must be undertaken. He also is known for doing extensive garden work on weekends. Contact: steve@cvda.com
Donna Hirsh
Donna is a landscape designer and project manager who joined Carter van Dyke Associates in 1997. She has a wide breadth of experience that ranges from large- scale complex corporate, institutional, and government projects to highly customized residential designs. Donna is a landscape architects landscape architect; combining strong project management skills, technical knowledge, a strong design sense, and an uncompromising and passionate attention to details.
For this reason, Donna leads the firm’s AutoCAD documentation standards so that everyone achieves the highest standards and consistency in all of the firm’s documentation. She received her Bachelor of Science in Landscape Architecture from Cook College at Rutgers University, New Brunswick. She has also studied Urban Planning and Design in Germany and she has traveled extensively throughout Europe. Before Donna arrives at work she has fed the chickens and horses and milked the cow. We often get to enjoy her home-made cheeses and fresh eggs. On Wednesday evenings she is behind a pottery wheel making new pottery. Contact: donna@cvda.com
Administration
Susan J. Carr
Susan is responsible for project accounting and bookkeeping functions as well as the day-to-day office management of CVDA. Susan is also our Marketing and IT Coordinator. Although she has prior experience in the insurance and aerospace industries, Susan says that the creative setting of a design firm is most to her liking as it counterbalances her precise business skills.
Responsibilities: Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable, Financial Statements, Project Budgets, Project Cost Accounting, Implemented Accounting Software, Human Resources (401k, health care benefits, life, disability), Marketing Coordinator, Contract Documents (including AIA Contracts and Government), Office Organization including Library and Archived Projects, Authored CVDA Office Manual, Office Management, Computer Systems Coordinator, Implemented various office procedures, phones, mail, and office filing. Assisting Principals and Staff with various tasks that need to be done. Thirty-three years with CVDA, thirteen years with the aerospace industry, and two years in insurance.
Hobbies/Interests: Reading, dabbling in gardening, and maintaining a 1732 Bucks County Historic Home. Married with two children. Contact: susan@cvda.com
Carter van Dyke
A s s o c i a t e s
Pennsylvania Office
40 Garden Alley
Doylestown, PA 18901
New York Office
6850 S Gannett Hill Rd.
Naples, NY 14512
Contact CVDA
(215) 345-5053 | Phone
(215) 345-4324 | Fax
Carter van Dyke, RLA, ASLA
Peter R. Fernandez, RLA, ASLA, CLARB