The Legacy West development in Plano, Texas. Image © Gensler

Before joining Gensler I worked for a number of years almost exclusively for foreign clients on projects far from my home city of Dallas. Many of the projects were situated in China and the Middle East, in which there was clearly stated preference for something grand, iconic, or monumental in scale. Their buildings had to make a dramatic sculptural statement along the street or on the landscape giving little consideration to the immediate context. If the overall form wasn’t a major concern, then often the client’s interest turned to recreating a particular architectural style. It wasn’t unusual for clients to insist on appropriating the traditional architectural styles of Europe, even if their countries of origin had little to no European cultural influence. By catering to their wishes I developed a capability to employ all kinds of architectural vocabularies, ranging from the classical to the contemporary. Before drawing a single line or extruding a model, it became a habit to carefully browse the works of Modernist masters, the Chicago School and Art Deco landmarks of the past as well as studying Bannister-Fletcher’s 1600-page volume of A History of Architecture.