Learning from
John Portman
// Mahdi Ghotbi
Real Estate Architecture
Downtown Atlanta
To find more about the role of architects and ‘the good architecture’ in real estate projects, and to find out how architects affect the quality (both physically and spatial) of this large projects, I tried to learn more about one of the icons of the model ‘architect-developer’ in contemporary architecture: John C. Portman as a case study. The architect of the Atlanta, his hometown, who transformed the downtown of the city with his revolutionary high-rise commercial and hotel designs. Who could change the city and was able to influence the lives of many citizens.
Brussels Northern Quarter
Portman is most known for his stunning multi-level Atrium, by which he was trying to bring nature into indoor and provide people with pleasant living experience. Furthermore, he was one of the first -and most successful- architects who started to co-finance and develop his projects. He believed that it is the architect who can bring life and spirit into the creation of a place, not the developers: “Only when architects are in front of growth can they influence its (the construction) direction in a positive manner.” In the following pages, I will try to examine his background and past, as well as his intentions and efforts to become a developer. Also, I compare the position and authority of the architect in both the United States and Belgium to address the role of the architect and his influence in today’s society. I will review the situation around the ZIN project and the influence of the architect on this project -as the latest model of magnificent, huge and expensive real estate projects in Brussels-.
Once upon a time... Atlanta, 1960
I opened my design studio, John Portman and Associates, in 1953 in Atlanta. My firm went on to design a number of landmark spaces in the city. Under Mayor Ivan Allen’s ‘Forward Atlanta’ program, the city’s population grew more than 30 percent and Atlanta ranked in the top ten in the nation in downtown construction! My idea was that I just couldn’t see abandoning the cities to the poor, I wanted to bring the middle-class back.
Atlanta, 1976
Supported by Atlanta city Mayors, especially Mayor Ivan Allen Jr. from 1962 to 1970 (Right) and Mayor Andrew Young from 1982 to 1990 (Left), Portman Designed and developed many projects in Atlanta city.
For me, portman’s designs contributed to Atlanta’s “peaceful passage” through the turbulent 60s.
They were also engines to stop Atlanta becoming one of America’s “donut cities”, their centers hollowed out by the flight to the suburbs of middle classes and the taxes they paid.
Atlanta, Today
Peachtree Center Mall | 1961- Until Now Atlanta Marriot Marquis | 1985
Hyatt Regency Atlanta | 1967
AmericasMart 1 | 1961
AmericasMart | 1961
Westin Peachtree Plaza | 1976
ATLANTA MERCHANDISE MART (AmericaMart) DOCUMENT SIGNING, 1959
After the success of AmericaMart, I co-financed many of my own projects. In doing so, I pioneered the role of the architect as developer, cementing my status as both artist and businessman!
I didn’t want to do schoolroom additions... I came to the conclusion that if I were to have an impact – and not be just part of a process I could not control – I should understand the entire project from conception through completion. That led me to real estate...
“With modern financing techniques. Portman is the nation’s premier builder of mixed-use developments, of self-sustaining villages plopped down in the middle of teeming cities. He designs buildings, and he puts together real estate deals. He chooses materials and hustles bankers. It’s as if Donald Trump and Michael Graves were rolled into one.” Steve Oney, Esquire magazine in June of 1987
I wanted to leave footprints in the sand!
This is Jonathan Barnett, American urban planner, educator and architect. He wrote the book ‘The Architect as Developer’ together with Portman in 1976.
Not only has he been able to take a more active role in changing the environment, but he has solved, at least for himself, a problem that has bested architects and other artists since the end of the 18th century: how to replace the aristocratic patron who had traditionally made it possible for the architect to do his best work.
Portman visited the graduate school of design at Harvard University in 2010.
Who else other than an architect is going to be able to take a big urban area and to look at it globally and to understand what it means to the community and how it’s going to work and how the people are gonna use it?
That it’s the architecture that leads, not the development! Two things that really make things happen: you got to have a vision, the creativity, the concepts but at the same time all that’s going on you have to have the pragmatic side because these two things yin and yang and they come together...
And something happens!
“There are a lot of people who don’t take him that seriously as an architect because he’s a real estate developer. Yet in fact his work has always been very serious, he cares passionately about form, he cares passionately about aesthetics. One effect the Portman’s role as a developer I think has had is that he’s played a big role encouraging developers to go further and changing the nature of the market for architecture.” Paul Goldberger, American architectural critic and educator
You’ve been a mart developer, you’ve been an activist, you’ve been a real estate developer, property man and just go on to painting… But someone asks you “what do you do?”, How do you answer?
I am an Architect!
It is not uncommon for the architecture sector to be described as ‘underpaid, overloaded, and undervalued’. Over past decades, many architects have tried many ways to claim their power in -especially big- projects and to lead the real estate projects into profitable contracts. Being the developer of his/her own projects has been one of the very common approaches among those architects.
Architects must learn to be cost sensitive!... There was a time when the concept of architects as developers was frowned upon because it was thought to be a conflict of interest. However, by understanding development, analyzing feasibility, and designing accordingly, an architect performs at the highest professional level on key with all of the notes! Here is a diagram explaining the integrated and iterative planning process to target and guide development by Bruce Redman Becker, from ‘The Architects Handbook of Professional Practice by AIA’.
Short- and Long-Term Housing, Retail, and Amenity Needs
Define Objectives Density, Mix, Typologies Sustainability
Master Planning
Open Space
Market Research
Adaptive Reuse Phasing Time-line, Budget Financing Options Site Ownership or Ground Lease Structure
Urban Characteristics and Neighborhood Connections
Financial Analysis
Needs and Feasibility Assessment
Precedent Analysis Community Outreach Existing Facilities and Amenities Analysis
Assess Regulatory Environment
For the architect, the architect/ developer practice model presents an opportunity to exert greater project leadership, have more freedom in the design process, have more control over what is built and the quality of its finishes, and, of course, make more money. The strength of architecture is that it supports the social and human ambitions of a company in a spatial way, without being dominant. If you, as an architect, also keep a close eye on the gross-net ratio, you quickly earn the necessary credits with developers. If you work as an architect for a developer, you never speak to these parties, because the developer is among them. However, it is very important to keep these parties together. If you combine these roles, you can involve larger groups in the process.
This is Nanne de Ru, Dutch architect and co-founder of the architecture and design firm ‘Powerhouse Company’. He is also The current director of ‘The Berlage Center for Advanced Studies in Architecture and Urban Design’. He is one of the architects who has started to develop his own projects from years ago, and claims that his firm has become very successful and high-yielding.
AIA
The American Inst itute of Architects
“For much of the AIA’s 150-year history, the organization prohibited architects from engaging in development work. Intent on distinguishing architecture as a noble profession on the level of fine art... It was not until 1964 (by then, the profession was well established and the success of architect-developers like John Portman of Atlanta celebrated) that the AIA relaxed its ban on working in property development. It even issued a document in 1971 encouraging architects to pursue it.” Deborah Grossberg Associate editor of the Architect’s Newspaper
For nearly a century, architecture was known as a mere fine art, and talking about money in the profession was condemned. The taboo against an architect taking charge of the overall development and financing of a project began to fade in the 1960s, when Portman started to change these perceptions.
AmericaMart, 1961
He seemed like a latter-day Robert Moses, a man for whom influence — not design — was the currency of the realm. According to some architects at the same time as him and many citizens, he was Half Artist, Half Savvy Businessman.
Although the real estate industry is the major force shaping our surroundings, it has done little to recognize its responsibility to the environment. With some honorable and infrequent exceptions, developers have been selling the public a very inferior product. “{Developers} are said to have the politicians in their pockets and show off flashy architectural plans. They would not stop swallowing the city until they have made huge profits on every piece of land.” However, she says there is no such thing as ‘immaculate construction’. The notion that developers are no good ignores the fact that money is made on every building and every neighborhood, including by other parties.” Emily Badger, New York Times
It seems that she is convinced that developers are part of the solution and not the problem...
Meanwhile, in Brussels...
“Art. 6: Practicing the profession of architect is incompatible with that of the contractor (builder) for public or private works.” Architects Act, 1939 ‘Law on the protection of the title and profession of architect’
The 1939 Act argues that architects have a monopoly on the design of buildings and structures, they are independent in the construction process, and there is an incompatibility for architects and contractors. The monopoly has been under pressure for a while and -especially- by the extensive use of new tools and contract models like BIM and DBFMO formulas, it has been questioned even more. Nowadays, many experts discuss the changing conditions and the different roles of the architect in today’s society.
Much has changed technically and organizationally since 1939. Both legally and socially, there is now a demand for cooperation between all parties, which delivers a good result that meets the wishes of the customer and in which risks are better managed. For a number of business models, such cooperation is not possible within the outlines of the law of 1939.
Marc Dillen, director of ‘the Flemish Confederation of Construction’.
Project developers generally have little interest in architecture... The post for architecture has been at the bottom of their Excel tables for a long time.
This is Pierre-Maurice Wéry speaking, Architect and Senior Partner of ‘Assar Architects’. Filip Declercq is the Architect, expert in architectural needs and potentiality, managing partner within eld and ‘eld architects’. Buildings have become financial products, with all the consequences this entails in respect of the architect’s respect for and fees. In fact, we should calculate our fees on the sales value and not on the construction value. The only way out is to move away from our classic role. Let’s just get rid of the monopoly. Why should architects not engage in project development, as long as quality is not compromised?
To calculate it mathematically, The total construction cost of the ZIN project is estimated at €375 million. According to the official website of the Brussels Bouwmeester, the fees for the architects were set at 4.75% excluding VAT for the entire contract. The associated architect will receive 20% of these fees: about 0.95% of the entire fees!
Which Architect will Prostitute for this Amount? Why is the developer Befimmo taking this sudden turn and is there an urgent need for an ‘additional’ architect? Is the company not satisfied with the largest agency in terms of turnover in Belgium? Yet exceptional for an agency that prides itself on being able to handle everything! Or has the Brussels Bouwmeester [Borret] set his requirements and can Befimmo only accept the proposal to adjust the project?
Marc Dubois, the Belgian architecture critic and the author, has been one of the serious critics of the process of how architects involved in the design of the ZIN project.
If you do it very mathematically, our impact on the design was 20% because it was 20% of the role of the architect. When you look at the design process, of course it’s not mathematical. There is a lot of engagement that we took in that particular design process that goes beyond the 20%. It was not something that was clearly distinguishable based on percentages or fees.
The Politician
?
The Bouwmeester
The Owner
Examining the process that led to the formation of the ZIN project, the question arises as to what was the role of the architect in the formation of this project? Has the architect been in the right place in the project? How can he find his high place alongside other major actors? Given the role of the architect as developer, can the new position of the architect in the role of mediator be considered powerful and effective too?
Our goal was to connect dots, to find out how to connect an owner with a lot of capital with a public authority or a civic organization with no money. I think the responsibility of the architect and the architectural profession is to constantly think about their own expertise and if their own expertise is actually needed to deal with the challenges of today’s society.
The architect is not just someone who draws to get the building permits, but he really thinks critically about how to deal with social, technical and spatial issues.
Dieter Leyssen is the architect and partner of 51N4E, the architecture firm that won the competition to redesign and reprogram the WTC towers alongside with Jaspers-Eyers and I’AUC.
ESPACE NORD is a master plan for the Brussels Northern Quarter by Jaspers-Eyers. It shows how almost all the important buildings in the area have been designed or built by them, or are going to be redesign and rebuilt by the firm. The role of the firm in shaping the Northern Quarter and in a broader context the Brussels itself is still controversial.
That’s how it always goes in Brussels… halfway through the journey, this office [Jaspers-Eyers] gets on the train and puts itself at the driving wheel… It’s happened several times already...
It is my goal to break open the Brussels real estate market, which is now monopolized by a small number of players... The good news of the current vacancy is that the real estate market has been obliged to reflect on the quality of life and work in the northern quarter.
They have the experience of very big buildings and we didn’t. So there was a good dual in a sense of introducing design expertise and urban expertise on the district and on how to do adaptive reuse from 51N4E side, but also just technical and design expertise on how to realize so many square meters affordable and qualitatively from Jaspers-Eyers side.
There’s always been, especially in the last century, a group of architects who were thinking about money and who were trying to maximize profits, often not the ones who also write in architectural magazines and papers. There is a duality between the more academic, a critical scene, and the more professional scene who is actually dealing with money a lot. I think what is very interesting in what’s happening in the North district is that those two again meet and can also learn from each other.
Brussels Northern Quarter, The ZIN
Los Angeles Westin Bonaventure Discussing about How Architects can Influence Real Estate Projects, I think that there is a subtle relationship between what happened in downtown Atlanta by Portman’s architecture and what is going on Today in Brussels northern quarter and WTC towers -now know as ZIN project- by the owner (the real estate company) and the architects (Jaspers-Eyers and 51N4E), that both made effort to bring back life to the district and revitalize it.
Portman did this by building glorious Atriums -in downtown Atlanta- while in Brussels, they designed a ‘public Greenhouse’ on the ground floor of the ZIN: Both want to imitate nature in a high-efficient and flawless manner contrary to the surrounding environment, and try to present something which was not yet given, not yet there, not yet present.
“The Atlanta architect known for his ‘Jesus moments’... when visitors would look up and exclaim ‘Jesus!’” Rowan Moore The Guardian, 2018
Atlanta Marriott Marquis
John Portman was able to impress many investors, the public, as well as architectural critics, by designing and building unique atriums in his huge and amazing hotels. His designs attracted the attention of people to the city center and many constructions in it, as Nonagon.style writes: “Cavernous atrium lobbies with glass elevators, waterfalls and cantilevered balconies may seem standard for most big-name hotels today, but that’s only because of the vision and design daring of Portman. He wanted to transform the hotel lobby into a bustling, thriving social space where guests and visitors can eat, read and take delight in the architecture around them.�
Jesus!
Atlanta Hyatt Regency
San Francisco Hyatt Regency
“What he created were internalized, self-sufficient worlds, where every need is satisfied, where the paying customer has as little need as possible to stray outside. His architecture is notably interior; the exteriors can be as blunt and anonymous as tax-collecting offices.” Rowan Moore The Guardian, 2018
The foundation of the entire project was trying to understand how people experience space and how space can have an effect on people. It’s like creating a symphony. You use space as the notes, and then you take people through it!
He once said that “I’m building a city that will become the modern Venice. The streets down there are canals for cars, while these bridges are clean, safe, and climate-controlled. People can walk here at any hour.” This approach then was called ‘interior urbanism’, referring to the exclusion from the outside, the city. Looking back to the history of architecture, it looks that “this time the machines Le Corbusier employed as models for design now reappear as instruments of disorientation and dystopian detachment.”
Looking Back at history, decades ago... What Emotion!
You are captivated, you have lost all sense of usual scale. You are overcome by a sensory world unto itself that tells you what it meant to tell you. Le Corbusier visited the Green mosque of Bursa in Turkey. For him, “the outside is always an inside”, means that an interior results when the elements of architecture impress themselves onto their surroundings, leaving spaces as their inverse cast. Decades later, in the early 1980s, Fredric Jameson, an American literary critic, philosopher and Marxist political theorist, entered Portman’s Westin Bonaventure hotel in Los Angeles...
This latest mutation in space -postmodern hyperspace- has finally succeeded in transcending the capacities of the individual human body to locate itself, to organize its immediate surroundings perceptually... This is no different from the overwhelming emotion that Le Corbusier embraced as a fundamental logic of architecture’s dicipline. But this emotion is disubjectified and ‘depthless!
This is not to say that the cultural products of the postmodern era are utterly devoid of feeling, but rather than such feelings are now free-floating and impersonal, and tend to be dominated by a peculiar kind of euphoria.
Los Angeles Westin Bonaventure
The important issue is the spatial organization of the postmodern city and how we are led to submit to its controls as well as to its charms, a castle city in which bodies of people are controlled. Looking to the Bonaventure Hotel...
It’s a Bastille-like Fortress!
This is Edward W. Soja, a self-described “urbanist,� a noted postmodern political geographer and urban theorist.
K. Michael Hays argue that, regarding to the painting critics’ notion of ‘theatricality’ and ‘absorption’ the Atrium in Portman’s buildings act as a theater stage, because it taunts its viewers with continuous exhibition.
The Atrium is composed as if beholder and occupant alike were not there; the architecture is oblivious to the existence of any space produced outside its own, even as it accommodates (or ignores) every particularity.
We can consider Atrium ‘as an imitation of nature’, as a productive force; the art of making up for human limitations by negating any particular character an presenting itself as pure potential.
You’re never far from the sound of running water in my buildings... In the lobby of my Hyatt at Embarcadero Center, I installed a sound sculpture featuring tape-recorded birds singing to one another.
While visually breathtaking, Portman’s buildings were not always well received by all. Many critics wrote about their feelings that Portman’s lobbies discouraged visitors from venturing outside the confines of the hotel and eventually resulting in ‘the demise of vibrant urban street life’.
“The mentality of Portman’s projects is based on providing space for a homogeneous society that is apathetic to those who don’t share the wealth. What’s worst is that every one of his Atlanta buildings is offensive to the street. The entrances are low and shadowy. And the most terrible thing is all those bridges. Walk around Atlanta, and the town is dead. Everyone is up above in all those glass tubes.” Richard Rothman An Atlanta architect
But for many politicians and city authorities, specially Andrew Young, Former Atlanta Mayor, these critiques seemed not so important!
I rarely heard Portman speak of religion or church. But the spirit of creation was integral in every one of Portman’s designs... It looked like he turned the world into a cathedral... I look around here (AmericasMart), and it’s a cathedral of commerce.
I’ve been accused of turning my back on the city, but what I say is that I’m giving the city new spaces away from the turmoil of urban life!
But Portman heard the critique about his buildings ‘that are offensive to the street, and the entrances are low and shadowy.’ Over next years, he attempted to modify his work to answer some of the complaints, like knocking down a few walls to install street-front entrances and shops In his older Atlanta buildings, and design numerous street-level spaces as open boutiques.
Los Angeles Westin Bonaventure
Portman started to redesign ‘Portman’..!
San Fransisco Embarcadero Center
In his newer structures, he’s designed numerous public layers and street-level spaces where there is a possibility to open boutiques. We wanted to create the amenities that not only it’ll serve the density but really be greater than that: serve the community! People can come down the plaza near an old village. They walk to a restaurant; they can do this and that, and then we edge and energize the streets, so we
have the best of both worlds!
So... Does history repeat itself?
The district needed a sense of hybridity: spaces that could be green space, office, meeting space, and cultural facility all at once in different periods of time.
The ZIN
Brussels WTC Towers
I am Now thinking of “the inviting public space” of Conservatory/ Greenhouse provided by the ZIN project, which is similar to the modifications that Portman applied to his building in order to answer the complaints about the fortress-like concrete walls of the WTC towers’ platform were like the ones surrounded the entrances of Bonaventure Hotel.
The ZIN
Los Angeles Westin Bonaventure “Fully integrated into its urban ecosystem”, “open to the city”, “seamless integration into its surrounding” are a few examples of what the owner and the designers claim about this project. They believe that ZIN “will bring life into this part of the city and will stimulate interaction seven days a week.”
It is something that they {the owner} offered to the public space like in all privately-owned public spaces! Of course, it has a lot of value but not necessarily financial in that sense. It offers the space between the public space and the private space, it could allow for events to happen.
But are we going to face a new kind of ‘privately-owned public spaces’ this time in Brussels Northern Quarter? A kind of public space that is supposed to be limited to the use of a small part of the people? Again, users from a homogeneous group?
“Privately-owned public Spaces as large squares, parks and thoroughfares appear to be public but are actually owned and controlled by developers and corporations. Although they are seemingly accessible to members of the public and have the look and feel of public land, these sites are not subject to ordinary local authority bylaws but rather governed by restrictions drawn up the landowner who are allowed to draw up their own rules for ‘acceptable behavior’ on their sites and alter them at will.” The Guardian
The Greenhouse of ZIN
There is still a question of How the ZIN project wants to respond to the neighborhood’s benefit? Were the neighbors and the civic organizations able to participate in the design process?
The process of the building was had to be behind closed doors because of the disclaimer in the call for the Flemish government... So, nothing about the building design could be shared with the public.
“The architecture of any period reflects the socioeconomic forces of that period and in that respect the growth in pseudo-public spaces is a reflection of the neoliberal city. This type of development is not inevitable: it’s a very Atlanticist model... It involves local government and the private sector working together in such a way that it is really undermining our democratic rights over the city.” Anna Minton British writer, journalist and academic
There are hundreds of Transmigrants and asylum seekers residing in a park just a few steps far from the ZIN... How this project takes trans-migrants in the Maximilian park into account?
It is very difficult to reply to a crisis like that and come up with the right solutions. Everything is recommended, everything is in terms of safety quite clear and if then suddenly something like that happens everybody just closes down. “Privately-owned public spaces appear unrestricted to the average person as long as they are behaving in ways that corporate landowners approve of, such as passing through on the way to work or using the area for spending and consumption. It is only by exhibiting unsanctioned behavior – holding a political demonstration, for example, or attempting to sleep rough in the area – that citizens are able to discover the limitations on these seemingly public sites.”
There is a fear of becoming more visible and many of them want to remain invisible in Belgium!
The Guardian
I’m allowed to lie down there, but not to close my eyes!
Maximilian Park
But history does not end here. It seems that despite all the efforts that have been made, there is still a long way to go to reach the desired point: Both for residents and for architects. Perhaps now is the time for architects to take on their new role, actively enter the field of action, and use their knowledge and rely on their social role to help society and citizens. Even with the construction of the ZIN, many troubles and problems will remain in the area. Transmigrants, the rest of the half-empty buildings, unsafe and secluded streets at night... But architects can shape the future in a different way, by learning from what’s going on in the design process of that project, as well as taking advantage of the victories and failures of architects/ developers like John Portman.
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Redman Becker, Bruce, ‘Architect Developer’, The Architect’s Handbook of Professional Practice, AIA, John Wiley & Sons, 2013. Saporta, Maria. ‘Architect John Portman ‘turned the world into a cathedral’ – Andrew Young’, Saporta Report, 2018 {Available at: https://saportareport.com/architect-johnportman-turned-world-cathedral-andrew-young/} Shenker, Jack, ‘Revealed: the insidious creep of pseudo-public space in London’, The Guardian, 2017 {Available at: https:// www.theguardian.com/cities/2017/jul/24/revealed-pseudo-public-space-pops-london-investigation-map} Soja, Edward. ‘The Postmodern City’, BBC2 {Available at: https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=hhyQ0HES8mM} Tilman, Harm. ‘Architect als ontwikkelaar – Wie maakt de stad?’, de Architect, January 2018 {Available at: https://www.dearchitect. nl/archi tectuur/artikel/2019/09/archi tect-als-ontwikkelaar-wiemaakt-de-stad-101230492?_ga=2.87786840.1161671708.15901805721546631370.1590180572} Way, Iren Holliman. ”Creating a City Within a City”: John Portman’s Peachtree Center and Private Urban Renewal in Atlanta.” Atlanta Studies, 2019. {Available at: https://doi.org/10.18737/atls20190115}
Credits John Portman Projects: Courtesy Iwan Baan, {available at: https://iwan.com/portfolio/john-portman/} John Portman projects, {available at: https://portmanarchitects.com/projects/} Old photos of John Portman and his projects, {available at: https://www.atlantastudies.org/2019/01/15/creating-a-city-within-a-city-john-portmans-peachtreecenter-and-private-urban-renewal-in-atlanta/} Portrait of Dieter Leyssen {available at: https://archiweek.urban.brussels/fr/interviews/dieter-leyssen} Portraits of Dieter Leyssen from: ‘51n4e architects: The politics of presence’, {available at: http://www.kruh.info/reader/id-51n4e-architects.html} Portrait of Dieter Leyssen, Courtesy Athos Burez - More images (including the one used in cover collage) {available at: http://www.pooliscool.org/howtoswim} Images of the ZIN project, {available at: https:// www.befimmo.be/en/portfolio/zin#zone-gallery} Portman Archives {available at: https://www.portmanarchives.com/} Espace Nord by Jaspers-Eyers Architects {available at: https://www.jaspers-eyers.be/espace-nord} ZIN by 51N4E {available at: https://www.51n4e.com/projects/espace-nord}
2020
