Our Legacy

Perkins Eastman claims a proud legacy, with roots reaching back more than a century when Co-Founder and Chairman Brad Perkins’ grandfather, Dwight Heald Perkins, started an architecture firm in 1897. Dwight later received commissions for the design of two universities in China. Brad’s father, Lawrence Bradford Perkins, would go on to form to the global firm Perkins+Will. The third generation would look different, however, when Brad partnered with Mary-Jean Eastman to establish a new firm in 1981. Brad brought experience as a managing partner, and Mary-Jean possessed key skills in managing large projects with programmatically complex buildings. Mary-Jean’s ability to connect with public-sector and healthcare clients, many of whom were women, plus Brad’s acumen for building an international business, added up to a winning partnership that has enabled Perkins Eastman to grow into one of the largest and most respected design firms in the world. Mary-Jean and Brad’s singular focus across all practice areas was—and remains—to have a direct, positive impact on people’s lives and the planet. By offering architecture, interior design, planning, and strategic-consulting services, the firm has grown to more than 1,000 employees and 24 studios around the world. And because so many of our projects are now executed on grand scales, each of them requires many of our core areas of expertise to converge, producing an outcome that’s thoroughly Human by Design. Our design recognition, expertise, and geographic diversity have thus enabled us to work on fascinating assignments in more than 60 countries across five continents earning more than 800 awards along the way and still counting.  All the while, like their own partnership that seemed so novel 40 years ago, Mary-Jean and Brad have fostered a firm culture with a premium on diversity that starts at the top.

1980s

10 DESIGN AWARDS
40 STAFF 1981
7 STATES
6 COUNTRIES

1981 ATTIA & PERKINS

Brad Perkins + Mary-Jean Eastman

Brad Perkins and Mary-Jean Eastman originally met at Llewelyn-Davies International in the 1970s. Brad moved to Perkins + Will in 1977, and Mary-Jean followed a year later. While there, Brad served as the Managing Partner of the Eastern offices while Mary-Jean ran the major design studios. They partnered with Eli Attia to form Attia & Perkins in 1981, which is where the Perkins Eastman story begins.

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    Bradford Perkins

    Co-founder | Chairman

    Bradford Perkins, Co-founder | Chairman

    Brad’s career spans 50 years, and he’s directed major projects in all the firm’s key practice areas across 30 countries. He’s the author of 10 books, including the 2021 publication of The Architect’s Guide to Developing and Managing an International Practice, and he’s lectured at nearly two dozen colleges and universities. He currently serves on the faculty of Cornell’s College of Architecture, Art and Planning.

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    Mary-Jean Eastman

    Co-founder | Vice-Chair

    Mary-Jean Eastman, Co-founder | Vice-Chair

    Since co-founding the firm with Brad Perkins, Mary-Jean has held a career-long commitment to designing and building programmatically complex buildings. Over the past 25 years in particular, she’s largely focused on healthcare projects, enabling great advances in patient-centered care with pioneer clients like the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.

1990s

56 DESIGN AWARDS
60 STAFF 1991
18 STATES
5 COUNTRIES

2000s

308 DESIGN AWARDS
395 STAFF 2001
042 STATES
018 COUNTRIES

  • PROJECTS

    2000 - 2003

    Green Chimneys School

    HCM Takatsuki

    University of Arkansas—Donald W. Reynolds Institute on Geriatric Research

    Rabin Medical Center

    Beijing Zhongguancun Science City

    Roger Ludlowe Middle School
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      Jeffrey Brand

      Principal | Executive Director

      Jeffrey Brand, Principal | Executive Director

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      Daniel Cinelli

      Principal

      Daniel Cinelli, Principal

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    • Francis Gunther

      Principal

      Francis Gunther, Principal

      A former leader in Healthcare

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      Stuart Lachs

      Principal | Residential Practice Leader

      Stuart Lachs, Principal | Residential Practice Leader

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      Mark van Summern

      Principal

      Mark van Summern, Principal

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      Jerry Walleck

      Managing Principal, Chicago Studio

      Jerry Walleck, Managing Principal, Chicago Studio

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    2001 Charlotte, NC

    Perkins Eastman merges with MedArc LLC, an architectural firm specializing in Healthcare, thus establishing a presence in Charlotte where we can better respond to growing needs in the Southeast. An additional merger shortly thereafter expanded the practice area to Healthcare Interiors, and in the ensuing 20 years, the Charlotte studio has added Higher Education, K-12 Education, Senior Living, and Commercial Mixed Use to its portfolio.

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    2001 Chicago, IL

    Perkins Eastman acquires the nationally ranked Senior Living architectural and consulting group from the Chicago firm OWP/P to form the core of a new office in the Midwest.

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    2001: Building Type Basics for Elementary and Secondary Schools, First Edition, by Brad Perkins

    2001: Brooklyn Supreme & Family Courthouse featured in The New York Times

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    2001 MedArc LLC

    2001 OWP/P Senior Living Group

    2002 Van Summern Group

    2002 Roesch Landscape

  • Timeline 37
    Azerbaijan • Bermuda • Croatia • Czech Republic • Dominican Republic • Ecuador • Great Britain • India • Korea • Qatar • Russia • Senegal • Tanzania • Thailand • Turkey • United Arab Emirates • Ukraine • Vietnam
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    2003: NYC OCME DNA Forensics Biology Lab in the Wall Street Journal: “DNA Paves Way for Crime-Lab Makeovers”

    2003: The Architect’s Guide to Design-Build Services by Brad Perkins (with G. William Quatman II FAIA Esq., Jonathan N. Stark FAIA, and Ranjit Dhar FRAIC)

  • PROJECTS

    2004 - 2006

    TKTS Booth + Father Duffy Square

    Hopkins-Nanjing University Center

    Jinan South City

    Shanghai World Expo 2010

    NewBridge on the Charles

    Kendal on Hudson

    Brooklyn Supreme & Family Courthouse

    Duke University Medical Center Emergency Department

    Perelman Center for Advanced Medicine

    Wanliu Shopping Center

    New York City Office of the Chief Medical Examiner
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    2004: Building Type Basics for Senior Living, First Edition, by Brad Perkins

    2004: China Travels with Perkins Eastman in Architectural Record

     

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    2004 Healthcare Interiors Inc

  • 2005: Building Type Basics for Elementary and Secondary Schools, Chinese Edition, by Brad Perkins

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    2005 Akol Architects

    2005 Larsen Schein Ginsberg Snyder

    2006 Urbanomics

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    2005 Shanghai, China

    After operating for 10 years in China, Perkins Eastman establishes a full-service Wholly Owned Foreign Enterprise office in Shanghai. Since that date, the firm has completed 140 million sf of buildings in China.

  • PROJECTS

    2007-2009

    Hanoi Capital Master Plan to 2030

    USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center Indoor Facility

    Avenues: The World School

    Cyber Garden

    Concordia International School Shanghai: Elementary School

    Centria

    Sheikh Khalifa Specialty Hospital

    Park Hyatt Saadiyat

    Harlem RBI: DREAM Charter School

    Huizhou HuaMao Center
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    2007: International Practice for Architects, First Edition, by Brad Perkins

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    2007 Basler Mosa Design Group

    2007 Liebman Melting Partnership

  • Boston

    2007 Boston, MA

    The Boston studio opened to expand Perkins Eastman’s presence and better serve its client base in Northern New England and the Senior Living practice area in particular. The initial Senior Living, Mixed-Use/Residential and Higher Education sectors were later supplemented by K-12 Education when we merged with the Design Partnership of Cambridge in 2016 and Workplace/Interiors with the addition of Packard Design in 2018.

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    2007 Dubai, United Arab Emirates

    As part of the merger with Basler Mosa Design Group, this was our first studio established in the Middle-East/North Africa (MENA) region as Perkins Eastman embarked on the large Park Hyatt resort on Saadiyat Island in Abu Dhabi.  The firm has since been recognized among the Top Ten in the Middle East. It provides crucial local management support for MENA-region projects across many practice areas, including Master Planning, Mixed Use, Residential, and Hospitality. That support means that even if a project is being designed in a U.S. studio, the firm can hold client meetings in the local time zone on that project, such as Kuwait University in Kuwait City, and in Saudi Arabia, Aramco’s New Community in South Dhahran and Dallah Hospital in Riyadh.

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    2008: Building Type Basics for Elementary and Secondary Schools, Second Edition, by Brad Perkins

    2008: Building Type Basics for Senior Living, Chinese Edition, by Brad Perkins

    2008: Architect’s Essentials of Starting, Assessing and Transitioning a Design Firm, by Brad Perkins (with Peter Piven)

    2008: Concordia International School Shanghai in Architectural Record

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    2008 Mumbai, India

    The firm establishes a full-service office in Mumbai to serve a wide variety of K-12, Higher Education, Healthcare, Science & Technology, Urban Design, Residential, Hospitality, and Commercial Mixed-Use clients in the South Asian region.

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    2008 Guayaquil, Ecuador

    Perkins Eastman retains an existing group to form the core of an office serving the firm’s growing roster of clients in South America, integrating local professionals with established firmwide practice-area leaders to develop projects in this region of 100 million residents between Colombia, Peru, and Ecuador. The office also provides collaborative project support to the firm’s North American locations.

  • 2009: TKTS in New York magazine, named “Building of the Decade”

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2010s

326 DESIGN AWARDS
500 STAFF 2011
046 STATES
035 COUNTRIES

2020s

100+ DESIGN AWARDS
1,100+ STAFF 2022
46 STATES
4 (and counting) COUNTRIES

  • PROJECTS

    2020 - Present

    Mayo Clinic Destination Medical Center

    Rutgers University School of Nursing and Science

    UCSF: Parnassus Heights Master Plan

    Brooklyn STEAM Center

    Benjamin Banneker Academic High School

    West/John Lewis Elementary School
    Timeline 37
    Chile • Kazakhstan • Kenya • Kuwait

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    2020 Raleigh, NC

    Perkins Eastman’s second North Carolina studio will serve this technology-based economy in one of the nation’s fastest growing regions. The office will build on the firm’s strengths in the commercial Mixed-Use, Science & Technology, Corporate Interiors, Higher Education and K-12 practice areas.

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    2020: Stanford Hospital makes the cover in Building Design+Construction

    2020: Metropolis magazine features Stanford Hospital

    2020: Interior Design magazine features MSK Koch

    2020: Brooklyn STEAM Center featured in Architectural Record

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    2021 Austin, TX

    After working on projects across Texas for more than a decade, the firm’s second Lone Star studio opened to better respond to the explosive growth taking place in this region across all sectors. Principal Hilary Bertsch FAIA, a proud Longhorn alumna, moved down from New York to manage this new studio.

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      Patrick Davis

      Principal
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      Alejandro Giraldo

      Principal | Senior Living Practice Leader
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      Carisima Koenig

      Principal | College + University Practice Leader
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      Michael Stevenson

      Principal
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      Harold Thompson

      Co-Managing Principal, Dallas Studio

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    2021 Vancouver, BC, Canada

    After working together for several years, Perkins Eastman merged with VIA, an established architecture and urban planning firm in the Pacific Northwest.  VIA began in 1986 as Baker McGarva Hart in advance of the Expo ’86 World’s Fair.

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    2021 Providence, RI

    While geographically close, the regional distinction from our Boston studio lead to the recent opening of our Providence workspace to help build on the cultural and civic bonds that existed within our Primary, Secondary and Higher Education sectors.

  • 2021: Healthcare Design features MSK Koch

    2021: Covid Centers of Excellence: Fast Company

    2021: Interior Design magazine features Vyv

    2021:
    The Architect’s Guide to Developing and Managing an International Practice, Second Edition, by Brad Perkins

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    2021 Pfeiffer

    2021 VIA

    2021 MEIS

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    2021 Seattle, WA

    Bringing lessons from Vancouver’s swift transition into the “world’s most livable city,” VIA opened its office in Seattle in 1999 to support transit-system planning and design. It will maintain the studio as a new Perkins Eastman presence.

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      Lauren Hamilton

      Managing Principal | Vancouver
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      Wolf Saar

      Managing Principal | VIA—A Perkins Eastman Studio

      Wolf Saar, Managing Principal | VIA—A Perkins Eastman Studio

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      Jean Marie Gath

      Co-Managing Principal, New York
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      Dan Meis

      Principal
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      William Murray

      Principal | Arts & Culture Practice Leader
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    2022 BLTa

    2021 Kliment Halsband Architects

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      Frances Halsband

      Principal
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      Michael Nieminen

      Principal

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    2022 Singapore, Singapore

    Perkins Eastman opened a studio in Singapore to capture growing business in the Asia Pacific region outside of China.

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    2022 Philadelphia, PA

    Perkins Eastman merged with the venerable Philadelphia firm BLTa, which was founded in 1961 as Bower & Fradley and whose early commissions included International House, Market Street East, and the Baltimore Museum of Art. The firm became Bower Lewis Thrower/Architects in 1979, and the name was shortened to BLT Architects in 1995. Its work covers much of the Eastern seaboard and all market sectors, particularly historic renovation and adaptive reuse projects, large hospitality commissions, and complicated transit projects. Once BLTa became A Perkins Eastman Studio in 2022, several Perkins Eastman employees relocated there as a result.

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      Michael L. Prifti

      Co-Managing Principal
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      Eric M. Rahe

      Principal