Colter uses his expertise as a landscape architect, urban designer, and certified arborist to shape places for people through a lens of urbanism, vibrancy, and social and environmental sustainability. He grew up in a family of enthusiastic naturalists and has a long history of hands-on ecological restoration work. After moving to Austin in 2014, he became enamored with the subtropical climate, rocky escarpments, and spikey flora and fauna of the Texas Hill Country.

Originally from the Chicagoland region, Colter has always had an appetite for adventure and travel, which led him to join the U.S. Coast Guard after high school. After five years of active duty in Long Beach, CA and New York City as a pollution investigator, he returned to his home state to enroll in the Landscape Architecture program at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. After working for a decade in design and planning studios, Colter's love of historic architecture, cozy pubs, and double decker buses led him to earn a MSc in Urban Design & City Planning from University College London.

In his spare time, you can find Colter paddle boarding on Lady Bird Lake and floating the Llano River. He became an avid birder during the pandemic (120 species in 2020!) and will talk about avian life to anyone who will listen. His favorite Texas bird is the Crested Caracara, and his favorite place to spot one is at Hornsby Bend (shhh don’t tell anyone).