If you’ve read anything about the Continental Congresses in 1774 in Philadelphia, you know how contentious a room full of hard workers can get. You need the right environment to get different people to work together. It worked in creating America, and Philadelphia has been creating important places to work ever since. Crafting the right kind of office space is not easy. You need the right person and firm to understand what your company does and how it does it. The top 10 office Philadelphia office architects on this list create unique work environments that take businesses to the next step.
Coscia Moos Architecture
1616 Walnut St. Ste. 101, Philadelphia, PA 19103
For the past two decades, Sergio Coscia and David Moos have designed stunning establishments found in the US and international locations. The two decided to merge their expertise and start Coscia Moos Architecture in 2010. Through their firm, Coscia and Moos has expanded their clientele to the hospitality, healthcare and higher education sectors. Most of the firm’s projects are new facilities for known figures in the Philadelphia corporate and real estate industry. The Post Brothers Apartment hired the firm to create its amenities building, Hamilton Court. The result was an 8,500-square foot amenities building that won the AIA Philadelphia Merit Award.
Located at the center of Bala Cynwyd’s business district is the firm’s latest office project, 150 Monument Road. Coscia Moos Architecture remodeled the building by giving the lower lobby a more updated look. It started with giving a brand new look to the entrance wall. The original entrance was replaced with a sophisticated glass wall and held by a metal canopy. The firm also added decorative panels to the entry so its exterior design would be cohesive with its interiors. The building cafe was also relocated outside so it can have its own exterior entrance and outdoor terrace.
Blackney Hayes Architects
150 S. Independence Mall West Ste. #1200, Philadelphia, PA 19106
Architects Kevin Blackney, John Fox Hayes, and Jennifer Crawford all believe that every project they take on must be approached from the client’s perspective. When they established Blackney Hayes Architects in 1988, they believed that hiring a team of diverse architects and interior designers was essential to achieve their goal. More than 30 years later, the firm has become an award-winning practice recognized by the AIA, International Interior Design Association, and the Preservation Alliance of Greater Philadelphia. Blackney Hayes Architecture takes on any kind of project whether it be residential, corporate, hospitality, or healthcare.
When Keystone Property Group acquired the four-story SORA office building, they immediately hired Blackney Hayes Architects to give it a modern look. Its exteriors were given a fresh glass wall that connects the building with its lush surroundings. The firm also updated the building’s new signage and lighting. The roof deck was also renovated and outfitted with modern furniture, and the main and fourth floor lobbies were reoriented. The building’s elevators now face the lobby and the receiving area was given blue backlighting complemented by new wood paneling.
The Omnia Group Architects
323 S York Rd., Hatboro, PA 19040
The Omnia Group Architects, founded in 1993, delivers an exceptionally broad range of creative architectural solutions to residential and commercial clients in the greater Philadelphia region. Omnia’s portfolio includes a long list of office and commercial spaces in and around Philadelphia. The firm has fluency in many high-end architectural tools, including Autocad, Revit and 3D modeling and building information modeling. Founding Partners Gene Grimaldi and Brian Mann are both advocates of green architecture, and have been practicing architects for more than 20 years.
The Omnia Group Architects designed the office space for the Hatboro Federal Savings Bank at the old Bank Building at 221 South York Road in Hatboro. Originally built in 1874, the firm made a plan that would modernize the building without compromising its historical character. The firm’s architectural and interior design team worked to blend the old with the new in this adaptive reuse. Re-using the hidden architectural treasures helped to maintain the historic architectural integrity. Highlights include the stone wall inside the front conference room and the 12-foot in diameter wooden ring of trim that now adorns the second-floor office ceiling area. The trim previously decorated a demolished dome in the original 1920s expansion. The interior strong metal frame of the original bank’s money safe door outlines the entrance to the kitchen-break-dining area.
OTTO Architects
453 Johnson St. Ste.#100, Jenkintown, PA 19046
Located in suburban Jenkintown, Otto Architects LLC provides architectural and interior design services for commercial and residential clients. Principal Joshua Otto is an architect who also practices in four other states. Prior to opening his eponymous firm, Otto worked for the prestigious Roger Ferris + Partners and Brett Webber Architects. He is an active member of the local AIA and has served on its Board of Directors and was the co-chair of its design committee; he is also the co-founder and coordinator of the Philadelphia Emerging Architecture Prize. Otto and his firm have won numerous awards, including the 2016 Storefront Challenge for Best Design, a finalist for the 2016 Restaurant Design Awards, a 2015 AIA National Emerging Professionals Exhibition, a 2014 James Beard Foundation Finalist for Outstanding Restaurant Design Award, a 2014 AIA Pennsylvania Emerging Professional Award, and a 2014 Remodeling Design Grand Award.
OTTO Architects was responsible for the new offices for Yorn, a real-time data and analytics platform found at 2400 Chestnut Street in Philadelphia. The offices are located at the base of the 35-story Center City residential tower. OTTO worked within the 3,600-square foot office space to feature an open, minimalist interior. Exposed concrete columns, shear walls, and large cast-iron piping are contrasted by the muted palette of new drywall, polycarbonate panels and carefully detailed blackened steel. The 18-foot high concrete ceilings allow for multi-level use of the office space to dramatic effect, while expansive storefront windows allow natural daylight to penetrate deep within the office. A large, centrally located conference room provides an anchor to surrounding office spaces of various sizes. Open office areas containing mobile workstations can be reorganized to adapt to the needs of internal project teams.
Krieger + Associates
14 West Highland Ave. Front, Philadelphia, PA 19118
Krieger + Associates Architects is an award-winning architectural and planning firm that services residential, institutional, and commercial clients for over two decades. The firm has accumulated a long list of accolades including a 2017 Chrysalis Award for best addition, a 2014 Chrysalis National Award, and a 2013 Professional Award of Honor from the Society of American Registered Architects. Krieger + Associates is led by President and Principal Jeffrey F. Krieger, AIA, LEED AP. Krieger brings over three decades of architectural practice to the group. Prior to founding the firm in 1992, Krieger worked at Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates in Philadelphia. He has been a registered architect since 1985 and has taught architectural design studios at Drexel University for 25 years. He’s also a member of the Pennsylvania Society of Architects and the Philadelphia Chapter of the AIA.
Krieger + Associates were the architects behind the new Comcast Offices in different locations. The Comcast Wayne Avenue office features a warehouse, office, and payment center facility, located adjacent to Roosevelt Boulevard in the Germantown section of Philadelphia. For its Comcast South 18th Street Office, the firm collaborated with Delran Builders to construct a 10.5-square foot warehouse addition and renovate the existing 16,000-square foot office space without shutting down the facility’s 24-hour operations. The warehouse addition includes a 50-foot clear-span space constructed of split-faced concrete masonry with a translucent panel system above that allows natural light to permeate the space. Krieger + Associates also helped develop the Industrial Investments Offices at 532 Township Line Road. The firm designed a new 4,200-square foot office suite with an inviting lobby, four private corner offices, an open administrative area, conference rooms, a kitchenette, and restrooms. The new cherry millwork is complemented by the liberal use of interior windows throughout the office space, providing natural lighting in the hallways and interior rooms.
Cecil Baker & Partners
1107 Walnut St., Philadelphia, PA 19107
Established in 1982, Cecil Baker + Partners is an architecture firm that offers feasibility studies, programming, design of new structures, adaptive reuse of existing structures, and interior design. The firm has received awards from the AIA, American Builders Quarterly, William Penn Awards of Excellence, and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Moreover, its works have been published across the United States, Europe, Japan, and South America. The firm is led by Principal Cecil Baker, who was born and raised in Argentina before coming to the United States in 1959 to study architecture at Williams College. He has decades of experience and he has received more than 50 regional and national awards for his work. Baker is also a past board member and vice president of the Philadelphia Chapter of the AIA. He was also the regional representative to AIA’s Standing Committee on Housing.
Looking to move out of its outdated offices, Fretz Corporation came to Cecil Baker and Partners to create their new headquarters. The Fretz Corporate Headquarters relocated to the same building as the Sub-Zero and Wolf Showroom at Philadelphia Navy Yard. Despite sharing offices, there were still 23,500 square feet of office space that the firm filled with modern amenities and unique quirks. A restrained minimalist passage creates a procession through a gallery-like setting that fully shows off a series of high-end appliances. Surrounding this passageway are unique “Kitchen Vignettes” that display Fretz’s products. Cecil Baker & Partners designed a space that can display renowned local, national, or international kitchen manufacturers and show off the appliances in the context of a specific lifestyle and aesthetic. The offices also include a training room and a state-of-the-art studio kitchen, which offers live cooking presentations that demonstrate the appliances in use. The space has proved to be a great resource to the design community and end-users on a daily basis, as well as for hosting significant gatherings.
Boxwood
1315 Walnut St. Ste. #1614, Philadelphia, PA 19107
Located in the Center City neighborhood, Boxwood Architects is a full-service architecture studio offering interior design and project management. Its works can often be found in the pages of Miami New Times, The Washington Post, The Washington Business Journal, Eater Philly and Eater DC. Founder John Weckerly, who has over 20 years of experience, leads Boxwood’s business development, project administration, design, quality control, and construction-related issues. His co-founder, Sal Guerrero, has 13 years experience in the profession and is also a graduate of Temple University Tyler School of Art and Architecture. He serves as Boxwood’s studio director, in charge of concept design, design development, and construction documents.
In 2012, Boxwood Architects designed the Vius office located at 1639 N Hancock Street. The 1,300-square-foot office design for the web design and development company included a new conference room within a heavy timber truss space. An industrial aesthetic complements the offices, while various hues of green were used as an accent color for the interior of the conference room to reinforce the company’s brand image. Boxwood also worked on the 990 office building in Spring Garden in Philadelphia. The seven-story, 160,000-square foot industrial building included work on the lobby, storefront, and steel marquee. Boxwood also designed the ground floor retail offices, restaurant spaces, creative workspaces, and the full-floor offices on higher floors. Some of those clients include the Roy Pitz Brew Pub and The Lucky Well BBQ on the ground floor, and they are currently designing The Lucky Well BBQ restaurant.
Studio Agoos Lovera
1 S Broad St., Philadelphia, PA 19107
Studio Agoos Lovera was founded in 1983 by partners Jorge Lovera and Ted Agoos after several years of working for leading Philadelphia design firms. After the founders’ retirement, Jim Row took over the firm in 1999. Rowe, AIA, has a Master of Architecture degree from the University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Science in Architecture from the University of Virginia. In addition, Rowe was director and president of AIA Philadelphia in 2015 and a director of the Center for Architecture. The firm has been awarded numerous achievements like the 2014 and 2013 Preservation Alliance for Greater Philadelphia’s Grand Jury Award; the 2013 PA Brownfields Conference, Extreme Makeover Award; and the General Building Contractors Association’s award for Best Adaptive Reuse Project.
When Aker American Shipping, ASA (formerly Kvaerner) needed a new office space, they came to Studio Agoos Lovera. Using an existing World War II-era building, the firm converted 40,000-square feet of space into a new administrative office space for the shipyard and the headquarters. The new office building is located in the center of APSI’s shipbuilding facility at the Philadelphia Navy Yard., The building is in between two active dry docks and has views of the Delaware and Schuylkill Rivers. A central axis incorporating materials and products used in the ships look out over the manufacturing operation and anchors the office workspace. Studio Agoos Lovera also worked on a 10,000-square foot office and warehouse that will serve as the headquarters of The D’Andrea, a long-established concrete contractor located in northeast Philadelphia. It was important to the client that the building put forth a strong, unmistakable identity that would stand out in an uninspiring, expansive industrial park. The front of the building contains all of the office operations and the rear of the building provides warehouse space for all field operations and vehicle and materials storage.
Metcalfe Architecture & Design
211 N 13th St. Ste.#503, Philadelphia, PA 19107
Metcalfe Architecture and Design was established by Alan Metcalfe in 2002 and his then-client Aaron Goldblatt helped him actualize the firm. Metcalfe is an experienced builder who’s worked as a cabinetmaker, contractor, and architect. His experience taught him that architecture is an interdisciplinary practice that must not only impress but also engage its clients. He partnered with Goldblatt because, as the former director of the Wagner Free Institute of Science, he is a veteran museum planner that has planned spaces made for crowds. Together, they have made Metcalfe an award-winning firm that makes creative designs for clients in the corporate, healthcare, residential, and public sector. The firm’s work has been featured in a variety of publications, including The Huffington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Context Magazine, The Philadelphia Inquirer, and The New York Times.
Metcalfe works on a variety of office spaces throughout the Philadelphia area. One of these is the law offices of Berner Klaw & Watson LLP. Metcalfe’s design team used dramatic materials of slate, glass, and lighting to transform the 6,500-square-office into a welcoming space for clients. Vibrant colors on the walls and carpet, and a custom reception desk, add character to the lobby. Metcalfe also worked on the Valley Green Bank offices in South Philly at 1536 S Broad Street. The firm renovated a 3,800-square foot former social services building to house their new offices. Metcalfe improved the building’s façade by replacing existing exterior masonry walls with clear glass, creating transparency that activates the facade on two street frontages. The firm also relocated an existing stair to open the interior and flood the space with natural light. The project was awarded the 2014 “Winner of the City” by the Philadelphia Commerce Department. It was also the winner of the Community Design Collaborative’s Storefront Challenge for Best Overall Design.
KieranTimberlake
841 N American St., Philadelphia, PA 19123
Founded in 1984, KieranTimberlake was co-founded by Stephen Kieran and James Timberlake. Kieran Timberlake employs more than a hundred employees that have a diverse set of skills. The firm is not limited to architectural services because it also offers site research and environmental sustainability services for its clients. Most of its clients come from the education, government, arts and culture, civic, and residential sectors. The firm has been honored with hundreds of design citations, including a Civic Trust Award for the US Embassy in London, AIA Honor Award for the Engineering Research Center of Brown University, and a Texas Society of Architects Design Award for the Cambridge Office Building of Rice University. The co-founders have received the prestigious Inaugural Benjamin Latrobe Prize Fellows. They are also known educators who have taught at the University of Washington, Yale University, the University of Michigan, and the University of Texas at Austin.
KieranTimberlake created new offices for the Consortium for Building Energy Innovation and The Center for Building Energy Science & Engineering in 2014. Spread over two buildings, the first is a 35,000-square foot building with an atrium event space, Immersive Construction Lab, symposium, workrooms, telepresence room, meeting rooms, and offices. The second building measures out at 25,000-square feet and features a lecture hall, equipment gallery, classrooms, training centers, offices, and administrative space. KieranTimberlake was awarded the AIA Philadelphia Merit Award for this project. The large, sky-lit atrium serves as exhibition and event space, with interior glass walls to provide public views of the lighting, building controls, and building information modeling labs. The new design also showcases energy-saving mechanical systems and lighting approaches for different space types, including collaborative workspaces for in-house researchers and grantees, and spaces for public education and outreach.
JKRP
100 E Penn Sq. Ste. #1080, Philadelphia, PA 19107
Founded in 1984, JKRP Architects is a full-service architecture firm built on relationships. JKPR offers a wide range of services that balance design, scope, and cost in each step of the project. Jerry K Roller, AIA LEEP AP, is the founder of the firm; he is a former president of the regional AIA and regional director and vice president on the National AIA Board. He is also an active board member of the BIA of Philadelphia. Roller is joined by Paul Georges, AIA, who joined JKRP in 1986. Glenn Werner, AIA, LEEP AP, has been part of JKRP since 1987. He’s also a member of the American Institute of Architects, Philadelphia; the ACHE/American College of Healthcare Executives; the Builders Industry Association Green Committee; the Health Care Facilities Managers Association of Delaware Valley HFMADV; and the Morgantown Area Business Association. David Urffer, AIA, joined in 1998 and is on the board of directors. The firm also includes Robert McCall, AIA, Jonathan A. Broh, AIA, and Jose J. Hernandez, AIA, NOMA, NCARB as principal architects.
The medical business community in Philadelphia is a huge part of the local economy, and JKPR has worked with numerous companies to help build their offices. One of these projects is the Constitution Health Plaza’s medical office building at 1930 S Broad Street. JKRP’s renovations included an open lobby space with a double-height atrium, connecting the two floors together. A new entrance was also designed to connect the public spaces with a shared outdoor courtyard. The firm worked to reflect the building’s new branding by using modern materials and aesthetics. The firm also worked on the offices for the Abington-Lansdale Hospital at Jefferson University. This new structure features a bridge connecting the third floor with the second floor of the adjacent existing building. Located on the campus of the Central Montgomery Medical Center, the space provides a place for doctors affiliated with the hospital to have offices of their own.
Cicada Architecture
1520 Locust St. Ste. #702, Philadelphia, PA 19102
Cicada Architecture was founded by Mary Holland and Kurt Raymond in 1996. Located in the Center City neighborhood of Philadelphia, the firm has been recognized with the Design Excellence Award from American School & University, the Rudy Bruner Award for Urban Excellence, and the Preservation Alliance Grand Jury Project Award. It is also certified as a Woman-Owned Business Enterprise (WBE). Holland has worked in architecture, planning, and interior design for over 30 years. She received her Bachelor of Architecture from Iowa State University in 1981 and attended the University of Pennsylvania’s Urban Design program, leading to dual master’s degrees in architecture and city planning. She has taught architecture at the University of Pennsylvania, Lehigh University, Drexel University, and the New Jersey Institute of Technology. She also served as the chair of AIA Philadelphia’s Education Facilities Advocacy Committee. She is joined by co-Principal and Vice President Kurt Raymond. Raymond focuses on community development, as well as commercial and educational projects, at CICADA. He received a B.A. in Natural Sciences from Colgate University in 1982, followed by a Bachelor of Architecture, magna cum laude, from Drexel University in 1989, and he is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at Drexel University,
The University of Pennsylvania is a huge part of Philadelphia’s economy, and when it came to developing their Business Services Office, they turned to Cicada Architecture. Cicada led a multi-phased renovation to better support teamwork and collaboration within the office. The design combined three separate office suites into a single suite with a common circulation core, supporting impromptu communication between staff in different departments. The project involved the reconfiguration of the light fixture system within the existing grid to reduce the number of fixtures. Using environment-friendly materials, it has improved light quality while still retaining as much of the historic existing interior partitions. Cicada also worked with the city of Philadelphia to reinvent the office spaces and community spaces throughout The Fairmount Park Conservancy. Working with the Natural Lands Restoration and Environmental Education Programs, the firm helped create five new Environmental Centers throughout the park, where members of the Friends of Pennypack Park and the park staff can coordinate together on the nature outreach and education programs.
