Nicole Burns is featured in our sixth edition of the SCAD Women's Lacrosse Alumna Spotlight Summer Series. The series started in the summer of 2016 and features four alumna each summer.

Architecture is notorious for being one of the most time consuming majors offered at SCAD so when Nicole Burns graduated in 2010 from SCAD with a B.F.A. in Architecture while having played lacrosse it was an impressive feat. What made it even more impressive was that Nicole also was a member of the indoor and beach volleyball teams and held a work study position on campus. While teammates and classmates questioned how she was able to manage it all, Nicole had a simple response, "I loved my education, and the goals the professors, and coaches set for me, and I didn't want to let them or myself down."

Seven years later, all of her time management skills, work ethic and passion have helped her enter a career as a chief stewardess on a private yacht where she is using her background in architecture to help design a new yacht build. As the chief stewardess she must be creative, detail oriented, and punctual all while living up to the highest standard in service. As if choreographing every detail on her current ship wasn't enough, Nicole has started splitting time in a yacht manufacturing headquarters where architecture is taken to the next level when designing a living space that must meet the standard of a traditional home but be within a seafaring vessel.

As an artist-athlete at SCAD, Nicole was part of the roster that helped usher SCAD women's lacrosse from a club program to a varsity program. While the demands on the artist-athlete remained rigorous their schedule changed from playing club programs to the NAIA teams that would make up the NWLL (which SCAD joined in 2012). Her senior season, SCAD had posted their best record as a program ending 9-2. Nicole was no stranger to success at that point though since she had already made it to the first round of the NAIA national championship in 2009 with the volleyball team and had ended either 1^st or 2^nd in The Sun Conference every year she was part of the team. 

Following her education at SCAD, Nicole had entered a traditional job, landing a position with the Orlando, FL based design firm Cuhaci & Peterson. As part of the team in charge of designing "face-lifts" for neighborhood Walmart's in Florida, Nicole was responsible for the completing site surveys, working with CAD blocks and base files, correcting blue prints and branding. While she was honored to be working for an established company she eventually decided to trade in her desk job to pursue a career in the yacht industry where the opportunity to travel and make use of her design capabilities was hard to pass up.

Nicole feels privileged for the opportunities she has now working in the yachting industry; from the chance to explore the world, to the chance to explore her own capabilities. Though not necessarily a traditional career for an architecture graduate, Nicole cannot deny how SCAD helped prepare her for where she is today. "I look back now on the priceless education, valuable knowledge and experience gained. All contributing to why I am thriving today in a unique industry as a yachtie and designer. I am proud to say I represent SCAD as a "Bee" and accomplished alumni."

You can contact Nicole about her work via email at nicoleburns16@gmail.com