Powers Brown Architecture

Powers Brown Architecture is a Houston firm practicing architecture, interior design and urban design. Its headquarters is on North Shepherd Drive, and it has offices in the Washington, D.C. area, Denver, Atlanta, suburban Chicago, Toronto and St. John’s, Newfoundland. Its project list covers industrial, office, healthcare, education, government, multifamily, aerospace and defense, self-storage and adaptive reuse work. The firm has signed on to the AIA 2030 Challenge and co-founded a scholarship endowment at the University of Houston. Powers Brown is designing CityNorth Industrial Park, the $150 million, 1.2 million-square-foot redevelopment of the former Greenspoint Mall at I-45 and Beltway 8. Lincoln and New York Life Investment Management are developing the park, E.E. Reed is general contractor and the first phase is due in early 2028.

Seven offices, and the addresses matter because the firm’s structure is built on them. Houston is at 600 N. Shepherd Dr, Suite 350, on 713.224.0456. The others: 150 S. Washington St., Suite 300 in Falls Church, Virginia; 2150 W 29th Ave, Suite 400 in Denver; 1720 Peachtree St NW, Suite 305 in Atlanta; 18W140 Butterfield Rd, 15th Floor in Oakbrook Terrace, Illinois; 411 Richmond St. E, Suite 206 in Toronto; and 354 Water St, Suite 402 in St. John’s, Newfoundland.

The firm calls that arrangement cross-pollination: offices in multiple markets drawing on a shared pool of skills rather than operating as independent studios. The Canadian presence is real rather than nominal, and the principal roster carries the registrations to back it, including OAA, AAA, AANB, NLAA and MRAIC alongside AIA and RIBA.

Three services are offered: architecture, interior design and urban design. The interiors group works from tenant fit-out and lobby design through to nightclubs and restaurants, with programming, planning and restack, landlord services, FF&E, inventory and documentation included in scope.

The project-type list is unusually wide and tells you where the practice actually spends its time: adaptive reuse, aerospace and defense, corporate, education, government, healthcare, hospitality and retail, industrial, interiors, international, mixed-use, multi-family, prototypes, self-storage, Small Smart Boxes, transportation, urban design and the firm’s own Value Office line.

The stated posture on project selection is deliberate: the firm says it does not turn away projects for not fitting a house style, and applies the same team to every budget level. There are, in its words, no “B” teams.

Powers Brown has signed the AIA 2030 Challenge, and co-founded an annual scholarship endowment for student tuition at the University of Houston.