Hord Coplan Macht

Hord Coplan Macht, which goes by HCM, is a Baltimore design firm founded in 1977 by Ed Hord, Lee Coplan and Carol Macht. The idea from the start was to put architecture and landscape architecture under one roof, and the firm has since added interior design, planning and graphic design. It’s still headquartered on East Pratt Street near the Inner Harbor and has offices in Colorado, the D.C. metro area, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina and Texas. Its work covers healthcare, higher education, PK-12 schools, housing and mixed-use, affordable housing, senior living and public safety. HCM is the interior designer for Goodwin House Seminary Road, Goodwin Living’s two-tower, 257-unit senior living community that broke ground in Alexandria, Virginia, in October 2026.

Hord Coplan Macht has operated since 1977, and the structure of the practice is the thing to understand about it: architecture and landscape architecture sit alongside interior design, planning and graphic design as parallel studios rather than as support services bolted onto an architecture office.

Those studios are organised by market as well as discipline. Healthcare, higher education, PK-12 education, housing and mixed use, affordable housing, senior living and public safety each have their own studio page, and so do landscape architecture, planning, interior design and graphic design. Affordable housing is broken out separately from housing and mixed use, which is a meaningful distinction, since the financing and compliance work on a LIHTC deal has little in common with market-rate development.

Geography is presented by state rather than by city: Maryland, Colorado, the D.C. metro area, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina and Texas.

On the leadership side, HCM appointed Sean Kefferstan as chief operating officer. The firm also runs a design competition, with a 2026 edition posted, alongside an internships programme and a published insights stream.

For an owner weighing the practice, the graphic design studio is the least obvious and sometimes the most useful piece. On a school, a hospital or a public safety building, wayfinding and signage usually get resolved late and by someone outside the design team; having it in-house changes when those decisions get made.