DC Metrocentric

Things may be getting a little dicey among our areas architecture firms. SmithGroup, one of the nation’s largest architecture and engineering firms, and JJR, a landscape architecture firm have joined forces to create a joint studio in DC dedicated to urban design, planning and landscape architecture… but all is not well!

Though these mergers of talent are not all that uncommon among design firms, according to a tipster this one apparently rose out of the need to keep conflicting personalities apart! The majority of the talent for the new Studio was pouched from rival HNTB.

The the old guard at SmithGoup apparently didn’t want the folks from HNTB around, thus the need for the new studio. The new studio is headed by Craig Watson from HNTB who did the 18th Street/Adams Morgan Urban Design Plan.

Hopefully this conflict will not have an effect on the the studios first large project which is the master plan for St. Elizabeth’s West Campus to house the U.S. Coast Guard and the Department of Homeland Security. [Photo: DC Tourism]