Neil H. Porterfield

The landscape architect and educator Neil H. Porterfield, FASLA, helped establish the School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture at Penn State University in 1997 in order to encourage collaboration and a multidisciplinary approach in these fields of study.  Porterfield earned an undergraduate degree in landscape architecture in 1958 from Penn State and completed a master’s degree in landscape architecture from the University of Pennsylvania in 1964.  His professional experience included more than twenty years of work at the design firm Hellmuth, Obata & Kassabaum, where he was involved in the design of the National Air and Space Museum.  His many other projects included an urban improvement plan for Doha, Qatar; a visual impact analysis for the Trans-Alaska pipeline; a campus plan for King Saud University in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; and a master plan for Tortuga Island.  Porterfield joined the Penn State faculty and became head of the Department of Landscape Architecture in the School of Architecture in 1985.  He was dean of the College of Arts and Architecture at Penn State from 1993 to 2000 and the Neil H. Porterfield Endowment for the School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture was established in his honor in 2004.  Porterfield was also honored by the Council of Educators in Landscape Architecture as an outstanding educator in 2008.  After his service to the university, Porterfield continued to practice, opening his own firm, The Porterfield Group, in Boalsburg, Pennsylvania.