The first patterns were developed in 1967 by a group of people working together with Christopher Alexander in the Center for Environmental Structure. Between 1968 and 1976 the first pattern languages were developed and tested for particular projects undertaken by CES. Several of these projects were built during this period. The publication of 'A Pattern Language' followed in 1977.

A shared pattern language in a project acts as the generic system which gives the power to the smaller local acts to form a whole. Within the process of making a project, every individual act of building differentiates space. However, the individual acts do not constitute a process of addition, in which performed parts are combined to create a whole; on the contrary, it is a process of unfolding, in which the whole precedes the parts, and actually gives birth to them, by splitting. The process of unfolding goes step by step, one pattern at a time. Each step brings just one pattern to life.