Simbioscity: You won’t find the definition in the Merriam-Webster dictionary. The word describes the business Denise Grabowski founded in 2011 and reflects her creativity and dedication to collaboration and sustainability, beliefs that characterize her business and philosophy.
“It’s a made-up word,” said Grabowski, a Georgia native and Savannah resident for 17 years. “Parasites take something from another to their detriment. Symbiotic organisms work together collaboratively, and it benefits both of them.
“With all the challenges communities face, rather than working against one another, if we can find a way to collaborate, have a common vision and dialogue and not compete … everyone is better off. That’s the philosophy of what I do.”
Grabowski gained a love and appreciation for the natural environment growing up in the Peachtree Corners area of Gwinnett County where her parents still live. She began designing things in her father’s workshop and took part in home improvement projects such as building a retaining wall or a bridge across the creek in their back yard.
She worked in the yard with her mother, who is a master gardener.
“I grew up in the woods and played out in the creek, sort of a tomboy,” she said. “I always loved being outdoors, which got me thinking about environmental engineering.”
“I got it into my head that it would be cool to be a civil engineer,” said Grabowski, “and wanted to design bridges.”
Georgia Tech was just 20 minutes down the road, but wanting to stretch her wings, she chose the dual-degree program at Furman University in Greenville, S.C.
“I could go three years to Furman and two years to Georgia Tech and get a degree from both.”
After suffering through the first three calculus and physics courses, she changed directions. Furman had an individualized curriculum program where you could design your own major, so that’s what she did. In 1994, Grabowski was the first person at Furman to graduate with a Bachelor of Science in environmental science.
Furman now has a formal environmental science degree program.
After graduation, she joined AmeriCorps, the domestic service program that’s similar to the Peace Corps.
“I was thinking about joining the Peace Corps, but this was closer to home,” she said. “It paid very little, but had an education bonus that provided tuition assistance for graduate school.”
During her year at AmeriCorps, she worked with the National Resources Conservation Service in Marietta, was a volunteer naturalist at the Chattahoochee Nature Center in Roswell and worked with schools building outdoor classrooms and nature trails.
“A lot of it was very physical labor, which I enjoyed,” she said.
She also worked on the Georgia Adopt-A-Stream program under the Georgia Environmental Protection Division. She got her first exposure to city planning working as a research intern with the Atlanta Regional Commission, the regional planning agency for Metro Atlanta.
While she was working on the Georgia Adopt-A-Stream program, Chatham County got a grant to start a local AAS program. The state coordinator passed Grabowski’s name along, and, at 23, she was hired as the water quality planner in 1996.
“I jumped at the chance to move to Savannah,” she said.
She moved by herself into an apartment on Whitaker Street across from Forsyth Park.
“Going from suburban Atlanta to that was a totally different lifestyle,” she said. “I could walk or ride my bike to work or to the grocery store. I had this park that was my front yard. That is what really got me started thinking about urban planning … and the way our cities were designed and built. Why aren’t there more places like this?”
With a new interest and direction, she left her job in 1998 and returned to Atlanta and Georgia Tech. She considered landscape architecture but chose city planning instead, earning her master’s degree in city planning from Georgia Tech in 2000.
While attending graduate school and during the summer, she worked as an intern for the city of Port Wentworth. After graduation, she was hired as the principle planner for Port Wentworth and worked on their award-winning master plan. She spent two years there and another two as a senior planner for Effingham County.
While at Port Wentworth, Grabowski worked with Forrest Lott, one of the founders of Lott + Barber Architects, on the city’s master plan. Through that connection and after a series of conversations, she left Effingham County and was hired in 2005 as Lott + Barber’s director of community planning.
Her first project was the Rice Hope Development in Port Wentworth, based on the master plan she helped develop.
At Lott + Gardner, she developed a passion for green building.
“So much of the natural environment is heavily impacted by the built environment,” she said. “It was … a natural connection for me to be interested in green building as a way for the built environment to respond responsibly to the natural environment in which we live”
After seven years with Lott + Barber, she decided to go out on her own.
“Lott + Barber is a great company, and we still team together on projects,” said Grabowski.
During that time, she became very involved in volunteer work with the U.S. Green Building Council and was one of the founders and a past chair of the Georgia chapter and now serves on one of the national committees. USGBC is the national nonprofit organization that developed LEED, the green building rating system.
She is on the Healthy Savannah steering committee, the Community Council for Savannah Technical College, Friends of Massey and was elected to the Georgia Planning Association Board of Directors. Last year she co-founded another nonprofit, Designing for Health.
“Lott + Barber was very supportive of my volunteer work, but I wanted to be in a position where I could be as involved as I liked and have the freedom and flexibility to pursue a new or emerging field. But I also wanted to be responsible to my employer,” she said.
Her husband’s deployment to Kuwait was the final clarifying point. She left Lott + Barber, started Symbioscity in January 2011 and moved into an office with a view of Ellis Square at ThincSavannah.
Grabowski continued to work on Lott + Barber projects as a sub/consultant and developed her own clients.
“A lot of work I have even now is through contacts, who you know. I love doing volunteer and community work, and it’s a great way to meet people you would not have otherwise met.”
A lot of Symbioscity’s projects involve public or community involvement. One such project she worked on while at Lott + Barber was Sustainable Fellwood, which transformed what had been a negative for the community into a vibrant neighborhood.
“It’s one of those projects you feel really good to be involved in,” said Grabowski.
Her clients include local and state government institutions and both private sector and nonprofits.
“I enjoy the diversity of doing both physical planning and policy work.”
She recently finished a project developing a training program funded by a grant from the EPA for the Office of Children’s Health, led by the Georgia Conservancy and assisted by Mother’s and Others for Clean Air (Atlanta) and the USGBC-GA.
Starting her own business was a good move.
“I don’t regret it for a moment. The flexibility and freedom are great,” she said. “I can choose a project based on whether it makes sense to me.”
Grabowski recently was named to the Georgia Forward “Young Gamechangers” class of 2012-13, an annual program that brings together 30 young innovative doers and thinkers to tackle a specific policy challenge. What role can Symbioscity Play in Savannah?
“Savannah has so much potential,” said Grabowski. “In 17 years, I have seen it change dramatically. We can work to make the places we live and work better … for everyone. In my work, I always try to look at things from diverse perspectives and work with people with diverse perspectives as well.
“We have to be more responsible about the way we think about the natural environment,” she said. “It’s not ‘Us vs. the Natural Environment’. We are the natural environment. We are all on the same planet, and the planet is getting smaller every day. I want to leave things better for my children and grandchildren. Savannah is ripe for those opportunities.”
DENISE GRABOWSKI
Family: Husband, Michael, and daughter Julia
Company: Simbioscity
Address: 35 Barnard Street, Suite 300, Savannah
Contact: 912-484-2018 or dgrabowski@symbioscity.com