F&S Partners Merges With SmithGroup

The merger follows two year of collaboration between the firms, including several healthcare and university projects in Texas and Arizona.

Nicholas Tamarin -- Interior Design, 7/1/2009

The SmithGroup might have an ordinary name, but the national architecture and engineering firm is making a bold move, merging with Dallas architecture firm F&S Partners.

Effective today, the 40-person office in Dallas carries the name of SmithGroup/F&S. The newly formed firm will provide architecture, interior design, and planning services throughout Texas and the Southwest. The office will also offer MEP engineering services through the SmithGroup's offices nationwide.

The merger follows two year of collaboration between the firms, including several healthcare and university projects in Texas and Arizona, though their relationship dates back to the 1970's. F&S was founded in 1962 as Fisher and Spillman Architects while SmithGroup, founded in 1853, lays claim as the oldest continually operating architecture and engineering firm in the U.S.

As a result of the merger, F&S president, Robert Shaw, will become a SmithGroup vice president and board member as well as the director of the Dallas office. All of F&S employees have also been retained and its five principals will maintain their positions.

The merger allows F&S Partners to design larger, more complex projects while SmithGroup gets a Texas toehold for its national higher education, science and technology, healthcare, and workplace facility business.

"One of the major initiatives in Texas right now is the elevation of its emerging research universities to national status, and we wanted to find a way to help our clients meet this goal," says Shaw.

SmithGroup president and CEO Carl Roehling adds, "F&S Partners has built key client relationships with the largest university systems in Texas. We're confident they're the right firm to accelerate SmithGroup's growth in the higher education market. F&S Partners has an impressive portfolio of recreational facilities, which fits well with SmithGroup's student life initiative."

From top: Carl Roehling, president and CEO of SmithGroup with Bob Shaw, president of F&S Partners; Taylor Place, Arizona State University's new downtown Phoenix housing designed by SmithGroup, photo by Liam Frederick; Stephen F. Austin State University Student Recreation Center in Nacogdoches, Texas designed by F&S Partners, photo by Craig Blackmon.