Alamo Architects, Inc.
San Antonio, TX 78204
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Alamo Architects, Inc.
Founding Principal
Key Contacts
Owners, Principals & Senior Executives
Ariel Chavela's Bio
Joining us from Mexico City in 1999, Ariel holds degrees in both architecture and engineering from the University of Texas, Austin. For Ariel there is no separation between progressive design thinking and state-of-the-art systems integration. Working with him is a fascinating mix of imagination and practicality, which he keeps in careful balance. His far-flung life after growing up in central Mexico and attending college has taken him to Italy as well, working on large projects for the Renzo Piano Building Workshop in Genoa. He was our Senior Design Manager for The Shops at La Cantera and Neiman Marcus Austin, and numerous other retail development projects. His institutional work for us includes several projects for The University of Texas San Antonio, UT Pan Am, and other educational work, as well as master planning city-wide.
Billy Lawrence's Bio
Though in Texas branding has at least two meanings, in design it tends to mean the creation of a clear and strong identity. Growing up in Corpus Christi Billy was involved with fine arts programs, creative writing and a classical music education that led to symphony membership playing the oboe. Unsure of his brand, to say the least, he was introduced to the world of a design education by a friend at the University of Texas and he never looked back. Leaving Texas like the other founding partners, he headed for New York and Philadelphia, joining Friday Architects there and working on his first retail project, a new shopping center for The Rouse Company. Retail design for him became a fascinating blend of architecture, interiors, graphic design and brand identity creation that has propelled his leadership in that area of the firm’s practice. Billy led the design team for General Growth Properties’ The Shops at La Cantera and has worked with other developers and retailers, including Neiman Marcus. Other brand identity exercises have filtered into unexpected areas of his practice as well, including the design of a new, approachable, and successful image development for the Humane Society of San Antonio and Bexar County.
Irby Hightower's Bio
Irby grew up in Port Arthur, Texas – Janis Joplin’s hometown – the son of a Gulf Oil refinery employee and a mother who was one of the first female graduates of the University of Texas School of Law. Weekends were frequently spent at the family farm in Coldspring, Texas, where he gained a healthy respect for the sanctity of the land and the power of nature. Following in his mother’s footsteps he graduated from the University of Texas in architecture and fled his semi-rural heritage to live and work in New York and Philadelphia. His love-of-nature past caught up with him in the earlier days of our firm when he signed on to be co-chair of the San Antonio River Oversight Committee along with Mayor Emeritus Lila Cockrell. Well over a decade later their tireless work and endless persuasion and cunning have resulted in the expansion of the historic San Antonio River Walk both north and south for miles, changing the face of San Antonio forever. Though he is expert in many areas of architecture and is part of the leadership of our multifamily group, Irby’s passion is urban design and he is a recognized community leader in that field, involved where he can be in helping shape the destiny of our city.
Jerry Lammers's Bio
San Antonio native Jerry Lammers grew up in a very big family, many of whom were football players, so he really understands teamwork. He has turned that collisional athleticism into a more non-combative but equally challenging running career, making us all proud of him for completing the New York City Marathon a few years back. Jerry’s work has focused largely on leading our primary and secondary educational facilities projects, with numerous significant projects for the San Antonio, Northside, Northeast and Judson Independent School Districts. Beyond that his overarching interest is in sustainability. When he entered college he was forced to choose between a career in architecture or his favorite alternate at the time – ecology. He is certified by the United States Green Building Council as a LEED-accredited professional, and heads our efforts to promote sustainable architecture. And he’s an expert pastry chef in his spare time.
Jim Bailey's Bio
From designing and producing board games to his current passion for endurance racing, Jim’s interests are wide and varied. He grew up the son of a family of pioneering preservationists in San Antonio’s King William historic district at the advent of it’s return to glory, and his love and respect for that unique heritage has informed his interest in neighborhood revitalization city-wide. Jim’s hands-on experience restoring numerous historic homes around San Antonio has given him a wealth of knowledge both at the scale of the individual house and of the complexity of the neighborhood in which it sits. With this background Jim has brought a real passion for quality to his leadership of our multifamily group. With over fifteen thousand units built under his watch he has worked equally nimbly with affordable, market-rate or urban infill/mixed use developments. His contributions to our planning efforts are invaluable as well, and he has participated in most of our significant inner-city master planning efforts, adding his own insights from growing up in the big middle of it all.
Mike Lanford's Bio
Mike Lanford is from everywhere. His peripatetic life as the son of a Fluor executive had him attending thirteen schools in twelve years. So depending on whom you ask, his absolute passion for travel either puzzles totally or completely makes sense. Like the other founding partners his education at the University of Texas School of Architecture led him to New York, working for Philip Johnson/John Burgee and Fox and Fowle Architects before coming to San Antonio. Mike’s varied architectural background includes experience with major high-rise construction and other large-scale institutional and planning projects, as well as project design and leadership for Alamo Architects’ major civic clients. He has extensive experience working with San Antonio area colleges and universities, state college systems including The University of Texas and Texas A & M, and has both previous and current involvement in projects for the City of San Antonio. Additionally he is the author of the new Texas A&M-San Antonio campus master plan and the Alamo Colleges Northwest Vista campus master plan.
Mike McGlone's Bio
Mike is from Pasadena, Texas and his dad was an executive with Armco Steel, so when we four founding principals were in architecture school together we got taken on a really cool, probably a bit dangerous, behind-the-scenes tour of the steel mill. Mike worked in the mill several summers between classes at UT and as such is no stranger to grit and hard work. Like several of Alamo’s founding partners, Mike’s experiences working in the east – in his case for Hardy, Holzman, Pfeiffer in New York – were transforming ones that would forever shape his approach and attitude toward clients and project design. No matter what the project, his dogged determination to get the concept clearly executed is a hallmark of everything he works on. He innovates in adaptive reuse, and our own offices are a shining and award-winning example of that, involving the re-use of salvaged material and an existing structure to build an energy-efficient, technologically advanced workspace. He is currently finishing an award-winning housing complex that is composed entirely of re-purposed shipping containers in the burgeoning Eagle Ford Shale region of south Texas. Mike’s community-spirited project work is extensive, and he has spent many successive summer vacations leading youth groups to the border of Mexico building concrete-block “casitas” with Hands Together Ministries. He is past President of AIA San Antonio, currently on the Texas Society of Architects Board of Directors and continues to serve in a variety of leadership roles at his church and other community organizations.