Established in 1953, John Portman & Associates has been providing innovative architectural and engineering services for over 50 years. Over time, our philosophy toward design has remained unchanged. This strong belief in how design should evolve has sustained us and provided the world with significant and memorable projects. Please read the following excerpt from the book The Architect as Developer published in 1976, that still embodies our philosophy today.

An Architecture for People

It is [again] time for a new definition of architecture and of the architects role in society. For many years the profession gained its sense of purpose and direction by creating architecture that would incorporate and express the technology of our time. That battle for modern architecture has now been won. The important issue today is the design of the environment. Architects must redirect their energies toward an environmental architecture, born of human needs and responding to vital physical, social, educational, and economic circumstances. We must work at a larger scale and with more complex problems than we have in the past, but we must not give up the ultimate goal.

When architects begin to study a new situation, we confront a mass of irrelevancy and confusion. We must work our way through to that kernel of truth that defines the problem in a clear and concise way. Then we can start spinning outward from this definition, evolving a solution that has appropriateness derived from the unique qualities of the problem at hand. It then becomes our job to preserve the integrity of this concept throughout the evolution of the project, to the day of its completion.

Frank Lloyd Wright was describing such a process when he wrote about organic architecture. Louis Kahn said much the same thing when he spoke of a building wanting to be; so did Eero Saarinen when he talked about a search for the spirit of the building.

I dont know what visual form a building or a group of buildings will take until it comes clear through this conceptual process. It is often a temptation to start with an image, or some other preconceived idea, and then to manipulate the actual situation until it meets the preconception. Down this road lies mediocrity at best. I seek to open all windows of the mind, taking nothing for granted. I follow Emerson in saying that in the light of new knowledge, I will take a new position, even if it conflicts with what I have said or done in the past.

The Application of a Philosophy

Architects must build up a consistent design philosophy. Such a philosophy is the rudder for the boat; it makes possible a continuing course in meaningful direction. I felt the need to develop a design philosophy in which I could believe, one that would give direction to my architecture and withstand the test of time.

Architecture is not a private affair; even a house must serve a whole family and its friends, and most buildings are used by everybody, people of all walks of life. If a building is to meet the needs of all the people, the architect must look for some common ground of understanding and experience [upon which to build].

The need for this common ground led me back to people as creatures of nature, perceiving their environment through the five senses. As I learned to weave elements of sensory appeal into the design, I began to reach those innate responses that govern how a human being reacts to the environment. In this way, I create environments that all people instinctively find harmonious.

I have come to call these principles that derive from peoples relation to their environment constants. Architects spend most of their time learning to deal with variables: the immediate physical constraints, site conditions, whats happening in and around the building, what the structure has to do under a particular set of circumstances - circumstances that might not exist in another situation.

The definition of the design problem comes from understanding the essence of the variables, but the solution evolves through the application of constants, principles of design that hold true in every case. The resulting design should be a marriage of the constants and the variables.

Another way to understand this opposition of principles and practical obstacles is to speak of statistics and dynamics.

Architects in the past have tended to concentrate their attention on the building as a static object. I believe dynamics are more important: the dynamics of people, their interaction with spaces and environmental condition. We must learn to understand humanity better so that we can create an environment that is more beneficial to people, more rewarding, more pleasant to experience. We are naturally interested in the latest structural techniques, in innovative building materials, and the technology of our craft; but we need to be more interested in people. Buildings should serve people, not the other way around.

-- John Portman

The Architect as Developer , 1976, by John Portman and Jonathan Barnett