Lister is a Professor at the School of Urban and Regional Planning at Toronto Metropolitan University, where in 2006 she founded the Ecological Design Lab, Canada’s first hands-on community-based research incubator focused on applied urban ecology and design. Through the lab, funded by national research and foundation grants, Lister engages, trains and supports students working directly with professionals and communities to advance research and develop tangible solutions to complex, transdisciplinary problems such as climate resilience, urban biodiversity and human wellbeing.

Lister is a Senior Fellow of Massey College and was Visiting Professor of Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning at Harvard University, Graduate School of Design from 2010 to 2014. She will return to Harvard in 2022 to teach a graduate research course on (re)wilding landscapes. She is the editor of three books, including the highly-cited volume The Ecosystem Approach: Complexity, Uncertainty, and Managing for Sustainability, the ASLA-awarded Projective Ecologies, and the author of over one hundred scholarly research articles and professional practice publications.

As the founding principal of PLANDFORM, Lister engages in creative practice that emerges from collaboration across disciplines, working with ecologists, artists, landscape architects, engineers and planners to apply research and develop practices that support ecological design in urbanising landscapes to transition to climate-resilient communities. Through PLANDFORM, Lister collaborates on projects that are transforming the way communities think about and interact with the natural and built environments.

In recognition of her international leadership in ecological design, Lister was awarded Honourary Membership in the American Society of Landscape Architect and an inaugural Senior Fellow of the Society for Humans and Nature. She was named an “Inspired Educator” by the Canadian Green Building Council’s excellence and leadership awards and was nominated among Planetizen’s Most Influential Urbanists.

• 2021 Winner of the Margolese Prize
• 2021 Senior Fellow, Massey College, Toronto.
• 2021 Outstanding Contribution to Graduate Education Award, Yeates School of Graduate Studies, Ryerson University
• 2019 American Society of Landscape Architects’ ASLA Best Book List of 2019: Design With Nature Now, edited by F. Steiner et. al. (N-M. Lister, contributing author)
• 2018 Inspired Educator Award, Canada Green Building Council, Ontario Green Building Excellence & Leadership Awards
• 2017 Azure Design Award for Social Good. Awarded for Extraction Empire, Canada’s entry to the Venice Architectural Biennale, awarded to Pierre Bélanger, curator (OPSYS) with N-M. Lister (Ecological Design Lab) and RVTR Architects.
• 2016 American Society of Landscape Architects’ ASLA Best Book List of 2016: Nature & Cities, edited by F. Steiner et. al. (N-M. Lister, contributing author)
• 2015 Honorary Membership in the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA).
• 2015, Environmental Excellence Award. Awarded by the US Federal Highway Administration to the ARC-Solutions Partnership (N-M Lister, Partner).
• 2014 American Society of Landscape Architects’ ASLA Best Book List of 2014: Projective Ecologies, edited by C. Reed & N-M. Lister.
• 2012 Boston Society of Architects (BSA) Citation for Design. Awarded for Botanic Overlooks: Minneapolis Riverfront (team award) to Stoss Landscape Urbanism with N-M Lister.
• 2010 Research Excellence Award (New Directions category) of the Ontario Professional Planners Institute, OPPI.
• 2008 J.B. Jackson Book Prize in Landscape Studies, awarded to “Large Parks”, edited by J. Czerniak & G. Hargreaves (N-M. Lister, contributing author).
• 2008 EDRA Places & Metropolis Planning Award, awarded for RIVER+CITY+LIFE, Master Plan for Toronto’s Lower Don Lands. Team award, in collaboration with Chris Reed/Stoss Landscape Urbanism (Boston), Brown + Storey Architects (Toronto) and ZAS Architects (Toronto).
• 2004 Canada Mortgage & Housing Corporation (CMHC) Excellence in Education Award, for outstanding educational contribution to sustainable practices.
• 2000 Canadian Society of Landscape Architects (CSLA), Citation for Design Excellence in Landscape Architecture. Awarded for Humberwood Centre, Etobicoke (team award) to ZAS Architects and Hough Woodland Naylor + Dance Ltd. with N-M. Lister.
• 2000, Council of Educational Facility Planners International (CEFPI), International Design Award of Distinction. Awarded for the Toronto Island Public/Nature School design (team award) to ZAS Architects with N-M. Lister.