At a gala last week, Jack Portman, chairman/president/CEO of Atlanta-based architectural design firm John Portman & Associates, announced that his company is transitioning to a new name: Portman Architects.
"Evolution has been a salient factor in our firm's longevity," Portman said at the time. "Our firm founder, John C. Portman, my father, wanted this firm to be everlasting. He began planning and putting our current leadership team in place in anticipation of the succession he recognized was coming. In 2010, the firm established the current leadership team comprised of principals Lell Barnes, Gordon Beckman, Greg Botsch, Rob Halverson, Norris Hunt, Walt Jackson, Pierluca Maffey, Walt Miller, John Nipaver and Jack Portman. This leadership team continues in 2019 to grow the firm by attracting new architectural design talent and working with developers to create unique typologies and memorable experiences, as evidenced by the newly opened Coda at Tech Square in Midtown Atlanta."
The firm's principals are leading a range of ongoing projects in several U.S. cities including Atlanta; Charlotte, N.C.; and Seattle as well as working throughout China and Asia.
The firm was known as Edwards and Portman through the late 1950s and most of the 1960s when John Portman partnered with a former professor of his from Georgia Tech. It became John Portman & Associates after Edwards retired in 1968.