Divine Design

Top 100 Design Firms

Statewide List of Architectural and Engineering Firms Grows by One Third

Texas Construction presents its second annual Top Design ranking, and the resulting list of 100 architect and engineering firms shows that the firms collectively billed nearly $2.2 billion in state and approximately $12.5 billion from all projects.

Gromatzky Dupree & Associates of Dallas designed 1900 McKinney Avenue, a multi-family residential tower that will soon be an addition to the downtown Dallas skyline.

One hundred design firms, with a collective billing of $12.5 billion from all instate projects, made this year's second annual Top Design rankings compiled by Texas Construction magazine. The 100 firms represent some 6,667 licensed design professionals throughout the state.

This year, we once again made every effort to reach as many design firms in Texas as possible, including some out-of-state contractors with offices in Texas.

Our hope was to provide a list that, while not necessarily representative of the entire architectural and engineering industry in Texas, would reflect the diversity of the types of firms working in and around the state. The information provided on the following chart was compiled from data provided by the firms on their returned survey forms. The Top Design ranking is based upon each firm's 2005 billings for projects performed in Texas. Totals of reported worldwide billings are also listed.

Seventy-five firms made the Top Design ranking in our maiden voyage last year. The value, collectively, of their in-state billings was almost $1.6 billion. The value for billings including out of state and international was about $5.2 billion.

This year, our 100 firms collectively billed $2.195 billion instate and $12.5 billion for all billings. The top five ranked firms each represent a different major metropolitan area in Texas.

advertisement

Topping our list again this year was Fort Worth-based Carter & Burgess Inc., with $200.06 million in revenue for Texas projects. CH2M Hill Ltd. of San Antonio moved from last year's fourth place to take the second spot with $133.22 million. Houston-based TCB (Turner Collie & Braden) was next, keeping its No. 3 spot for the second year with $98.5 million. New to the list year is PBS&J,. which landed in the fourth spot with $94.86 million. The firm's main Texas office is in Austin, and the majority of its work is in the transportation sector. And rounding out the top five was HKS Inc. of Dallas with $75.72 million. Last year the firm was ranked No. 2.

The remaining top 10 included: 6) URS Corp. of Austin, $71 million; 7) HNTB Corp. of Plano, $64.8 million; 8) HDR Inc. of Dallas, $61.4 million; 9) Pape-Dawson Engineers Inc. of San Antonio, $53.8 million; and 10) Halff Associates Inc. of Dallas, $49.9 million.

On the following pages we have included other useful information about each listed firm, including areas of specialty by category percentage, Web sites, physical addresses and phone and fax numbers of main offices.

We also asked a group of design firms to submit a project to us to highlight in this issue. We specified that the project should have been completed after 2004 or is currently in the design or construction phase. Those firms were selected based on geographic and industry sector diversity, and here we present those projects as a "designers' showcase."

Texas' Top Design Firms. Full List >>

Click here for a pictorial sampling of some of the latest designs from around the Lone Star State >>