Center city meshes with architects’ design

Brandon Dake and Andrew Wells formed Dake | Wells Architecture Inc. June 27. The pair will open their new downtown office above Well Fed Head Books at 331 S. Campbell, on Sept. 15.

The two architects’ July 28 exodus from Butler, Rosenbury & Partners Inc. followed more than five months of deliberation on the idea, Dake said. The downtown location, in “the economic center of the city,” was a logical choice, he added.

“It just made sense to be down there,” Dake said. “We really shopped around at a lot of different spaces, and we were wanting something that was really flexible and had a good lease rate.” The firm rents its 1,800 square feet for $6.66 a square foot under a three-year-lease with developer Scott Tillman.

“I think we both had interest in being in an urban environment. That’s the kind of work we want to do,” Wells said. While the two have done work in both commercial and residential arenas, it’s civic-oriented projects – “meaningful architecture,” such as churches, nonprofits and educational institutions, that will be part of their emphasis, he added.

The two architects are currently working on a private residence in Nixa, as well as designing a new showroom and an image upgrade for Kansas Auto Auction in Elwood, Kan., Wells said.

Dake | Wells Architecture is the second new design firm to locate downtown in recent months. Hagerman New Urbanism opened its doors at 122 Park Central Square July 1. For co-owner Bo Hagerman, the downtown location fits his firm’s emphasis on designing urban areas where denser populations can thrive in a user-friendly context.

“The only part of the city that’s not basically a big suburb of sprawl is the downtown, so we really didn’t have a lot to work with. We decided to go downtown because we wanted to exemplify what we wanted to do (architecturally),” he said.

While larger firms lose personnel to entrepreneurial spirit, it’s an attraction that large firm principals understand.

“We always hate to lose talented people, but at the same time we don’t want to stand in the way of anybody chasing a dream,” said Geoffrey Butler, principal of Butler, Rosenbury & Partners. “That’s why we’re here, because we chased our own dream.”

That dream will soon take Butler, Rosenbury from the Kenneth E. Meyer Alumni Center at 300 S. Jefferson to a new, 20,000-square-foot office in the former Springfield Seed building at 319 N. Main. “The total project is around $3.25 million, and that includes acquiring the building and then doing all the work,” Butler said.

When architects leave Butler, Rosenbury & Partners, the firm’s market share isn’t negatively affected because of noncompete agreements, Butler said. “They can’t contact any of our clients or any of the people that we’ve worked with since Wells joined the firm as a shareholder,” he said. “That was part of the shareholder agreement that they agreed to when they came in.”

The noncompete requires that exiting shareholders “not do work for clients that have been on the books for Butler, Rosenbury dating back to 1998,” Wells said. The noncompete was “part of our corporate redemption agreement there,” he added.