At Proformus, we believe great places don’t happen by accident, they emerge through intention, process, and design. Our work focuses on unlocking development potential at every scale, from site-specific strategies to district frameworks, always with an eye toward creating places that are vibrant, adaptable, and built to grow with people over time. →

Placekeeping | Land Use & Development | Urban Design & Planning | Mapping

A lively community yard with kids playing soccer, adults walking and talking, a woman with a bike, and large trees in front of a multi-story brick building with a porch, surrounded by a white picket fence and lush greenery under a clear blue sky with a few birds flying.
Diagram showing different installation options for a corner sign, illustrating the angles for one face and two face sign areas.

Infilling Carolina →

📍North Carolina, USA

Placekeeping | Urban Design & Planning

We were hired to visualize what upzoning in-demand parcels in three areas of the state could look like for future infill. We focused on Charlotte, Raleigh, and areas in the Research Triangle.

A diagram showing a construction site plan with labeled measurements and sections for set back maximum, building footprint, and surrounding landscape.

Rockville Zoning Code →

📍Rockville, Maryland

Urban Design & Planning | Land Use + Development

In our latest collaboration with ZoneCo, we helped translate Rockville’s new Development Code into a clear and visually engaging graphic language. The goal: make zoning ideas intuitive, transparent, and usable for everyone.

PLANDanville →

📍Danville, Virginia

Urban Design & Planning | Land Use + Development

The updated zoning code and graphics transforms technical standards into an illustrated guide for good urbanism, ensuring that design intent and policy speak the same language in southern Virginia.

An urban street corner with colorful geometric-painted sidewalk areas, parked and moving cars, people walking and skating, trees, street lamps, and a crosswalk, with the street named Tighe Street.

Chatham Arch 10th Street Traffic Calming Initiative →

📍Indianapolis, Indiana

Placekeeping | Urban Design & Planning

Our tactical urbanism project in the historic Chatham Arch neighborhood of Indianapolis will transform two key intersections, 10th Street & Park Avenue and 10th Street & Broadway—into age-safer spaces with curb bulb outs. We are partnering with AARP to complete the neighborhood’s vision.

Illustration of an urban neighborhood street scene with walkable sidewalks, bike lanes, small shops, trees, and high-rise towers in the background. Labels highlight features such as neighborhood-serving businesses, small parcels, diverse street wall, large towers, and planned megaprojects.

Thinking Big by Thinking Small →

📍Chicago, Illinois

Urban Design & Planning | Land Use + Development

In our latest white paper, we introduce ChiGRUPPEN and the Hyperlocal Parcel Model, a new development framework designed to break up massive project sites into smaller, community-scaled pieces. Instead of waiting for a single developer to shape entire neighborhoods, this model empowers everyday Chicagoans - through individual parcels or cooperative half-blocks—to build the city from the ground up.

A colorful neighborhood map showing houses, trees, and various icons indicating resources and amenities.

Smart Blocks →

📍Muncie, Indiana

Urban Design & Planning | Land Use + Development

The Smart Block Model ideates an approach to build a more resilient and sustainable Muncie while allowing for flexibility and breaking up the rigidity of normal land-grabbing necessary for development.

A map of an urban area with illustrations of people engaging in various activities such as walking, cycling, skateboarding, and socializing, overlaid by green dashed and solid lines indicating different pathways and routes.

Mass Ave Next →

📍Indianapolis, Indiana

Placekeeping | Urban Design & Planning | Mapping

The Mass Ave Certified Planning engagement is a is a community-led initiative that will provide a framework to shape the public space network in the Mass Ave Arts and Cultural District (MACAD) for the next five years as part of the City of Indianapolis’ Certified Planning Process.

A detailed map showing a comprehensive urban planning project with waterways, parks, green spaces, and streets interconnected through arrows indicating transportation and flow.

Indy Health District* →

📍Indianapolis, Indiana

Placekeeping | Urban Design & Planning | Mapping

Jeffery Tompkins, founder at Proformus, served as a co-lead planner for the 1,500-acre Indy Health District—the largest planned health innovation district in the Western Hemisphere. In partnership with Perkins&Will as part of the METICULOUS team, he helped shape the urban framework surrounding IU Health’s $4.3B downtown hospital investment.

Let’s talk!

Your city isn’t boring, so why should your planning be? Let’s plan better, for better places. For us.