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Annie Julia Wyman is a graduate student in the Harvard Department of English, where she studies comedy. She is a former editor at McSweeney's and the former publisher of the American Reader. Her writing has appeared widely in print and online.

Greg Afinogenov is completing his Ph.D in Russian history at Harvard. His writing has appeared on the n+1 and Bookforum websites and in the London Review of Books.

Dan Albert is a freelance writer based in Marblehead. He writes on business, science, and cars. He holds a Ph.D in history from the University of Michigan, where he studied roads, cars, and American life.

As a founding principal of Elkus Manfredi Architects, David Manfredi has worked to protect and rebuild urban places all across the United States, creating a thriving new generation of neighborhoods, academic campuses, and main streets that honor their heritage and environment while embracing the 21st century. His architectural and planning practice is grounded in a commitment to create inspiring spaces and durable, livable communities, and has earned long-term relationships with leading institutions, corporate entities, and the nation’s most successful developers.

Anita Berrizbeitia is Professor of Landscape Architecture and Director of the Master in Landscape Architecture Degree Programs at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. Her research focuses on design theories of modern and contemporary landscape architecture, the productive aspects of landscapes, and Latin American cities and landscapes. She was awarded the 2005/2006 Prince Charitable Trusts Rome Prize Fellowship in Landscape Architecture.

McMillan started practicing over 25 years ago and worked on the design of the 1988 World's Fair and the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games. His particular area of expertise is transforming challenging sites into valued cultural and natural places as evidenced in cities he worked for. His award winning work has led him to projects around the globe, contributing articles in the Urban Land Institute & Earth Pledge Foundation publications, speaking on landscape & urban design issues, judging excellence in development awards and as a studio instructor at Harvard's School of Design.

A committed practitioner, teacher, critic, and writer, Gary is Professor in Practice at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, where he has taught since 1990. His honors include Harvard University’s Charles Eliot Traveling Fellowship, the Rome Prize in Landscape Architecture, the Architectural League’s Emerging Voices Award with Douglas Reed, and the 2013 ASLA Firm of the Year award.

J. Meejin Yoon is an architect, designer and educator. Yoon is currently Head of the Department of Architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She has taught undergraduate and graduate architecture studios, interdisciplinary workshops and lecture courses at MIT for the past 14 years. She is the 2013 recipient of MIT’s Irwin Sizer Award for the Most Significant Improvement (and innovations) to Education.

Julie Crockford is responsible for all day-to-day operations, long- range planning and the fiscal health and well-being of the Emerald Necklace conservancy. She works with the board and staff to develop the budget, expand fundraising efforts, create programming and design strategies to further the organization’s mission to protect, restore and maintain parks of the Emerald Necklace designed by Frederick Law Olmsted.

Born in Hong Kong and raised in the United States, Rosana Wan is a park ranger at the Adams National Historical Park, a sergeant in the Army National Guard, and the first recipient of the John C. Cavanagh Prize in History at Suffolk University.

Jessica Fechtor is the writer of popular food blog Sweet Amandine. At 28, she was happily immersed in graduate school and her young marriage, and thinking about starting a family. Then one day, she went for a run and an aneurysm burst in her brain. She nearly died. She lost her sense of smell, the sight in her left eye, and was forced to the sidelines of the life she loved. Jessica’s recovery began in the kitchen. Her book, Stir: My Broken Brain and the Meals That Brought Me Home, describes her journey to recovery through the restorative powers of cooking and baking.

Kathy Gunst a food writer, cookbook author, and "Resident Chef" for NPR's award-winning show, Here and Now. Recipient of the 2015 James Beard Award for "Home Cooking" in Journalism, she is the author of 14 cookbooks and she writes freelance magazine and newspaper articles. Her pieces have appeared in the Washington Post, New York Times, Food & Wine, Yankee, Down East, Modern Farmer, Better Homes and Gardens and more.