In Texas and beyond, Lake|Flato is known for a portfolio of contextually sensitive homes and larger projects across hospitality, institutional, and cultural sectors. Since its founding by David Lake and Ted Flato in 1984, the firm’s designers have worked from a 1920s-era office building in downtown San Antonio, blocks from the Alamo. Previously it was home to a Black gospel radio station, a law firm, an investment banking firm, and an interior design firm. Lake|Flato began on the second floor, and as the team grew, it gradually took over the entirety of the structure’s three stories, occupying the interior with a maze of cluttered offices. Today the office numbers over 150 people: How could the team improve its workplace to better accommodate its growth and reflect its design philosophy?

A scheme to do just this was in place before the pandemic, but the realities of remote and, later, hybrid work shaped Lake|Flato’s decisions. The time apart provided “clarity and value about the importance of working together,” Flato told AN Interior. “It was clear that our profession, and the way we design, is a collaborative sport, and you can’t do it any other way than to be together in an office.”

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