As the son of a contractor, John grew up to be “interested and excited about all things building, construction, and design.” He got a good grounding in architecture early in his career, working for a small, sole-proprietor firm where he did a little bit of everything, from proposals to shop drawings to design. “It was very immediate—you would draw something, and a couple weeks later, they’d actually be building it,” he says. His boss, furthermore, was a dedicated mentor (and fellow Virginia Tech alum) who never passed up a teaching moment. John has adopted that mission in his own work, while also engaged in making the design of residential and commercial buildings a placemaking part of the community and its urban fabric. He’s especially interested in transforming “single-use” developments—malls, subdivisions, office parks—into a mixed-use, integrated whole.

Our Perkins Eastman

John came to Perkins Eastman because of its open, collaborative environment under DC managing principals Barbara Mullenex and Gary Steiner. He believes collaboration is the best way to teach younger professionals, “because that’s how it sticks.”