About
Hi, I'm Karen!
I'm an community-centered researcher, designer, and storyteller based between Cambridge and New York. I recently graduated in May 2026 with a degree in Urban Studies & Social Justice from Harvard.
My work moves between fieldwork and design that ask people to think about the places they call home. I'm drawn to informal moments where care and community are built. My goal is to build human centered spaces that are imbue empathy within our cities.
shot on the Ikon Zeiss Contaflex, Porta 400
What I work on
Community research
Cross-diciplinary interviews, participatory mapping, and fieldwork with residents, community groups, planners, architects, health workers, academics, and more.
Urban & public space design
Reimagining shared spaces that facilitate and encourage human-first connection.
Oral history & storytelling
Photo essays, letters, and recorded conversations that carry memory forward.
Methods & tools
Stakeholder Relations, Community Engagement, Participatory Action Research, Ethnography, Oral Histories, Land Use & Zoning Research, Policy Analysis, Grant Writing, Prototyping and Design. Comfortable in Figma, ArcGIS, R, Rhino, Enscape, Adobe Creative Suite (Photoshop, InDesign), Microsoft Suite.