By Dennis Quick
Senior Staff Writer

Charleston architecture firm LS3P Associates continues to grow and evolve after more than 30 years.

In January, the firm merged with North Carolina-based Boney Architects. The new entity is known as LS3P/Boney.

“The merger was a meeting of like minds and cultures,” says LS3P President and CEO Thompson Penney.

Boney Architects CEO Paul Davis Boney suggested the merger at the end of 2003, Penney says. During that year, the two worked together in the planning and execution of the American Institute of Architects’ national convention in San Diego, an event attracting some 20,000 architects. Penney was then the AIA’s national president. Boney, at Penney’s request, served as convention chairman.

After ironing out the merger details in 2004, the two firms officially joined in January 2005.

The merger brought architectural muscle to both firms, which have a combined staff of nearly 220 employees serving the Carolinas, and the firms have completed thousands of projects worth more than $7 billion in today’s construction costs. Their combined markets include schools, health care facilities, corporate offices, commercial buildings, retail outlets and mixed-used developments. Additionally, LS3P offers interior design services.

With LS3P’s recent opening of its Columbia office, the two firms increased their foothold to five cities—Charleston and Columbia in South Carolina and Wilmington, Raleigh and Charlotte in North Carolina.

Both LS3P and Boney Architects have deep AIA roots, Penney points out. Boney, who serves as chief strategic officer, is a former AIA North Carolina president and a former national vice president for the association. Frank Lucas, who founded LS3P in 1963 and serves as chairman, founded the AIA’s Charleston chapter that same year. Before becoming the AIA’s national president, Penney served as president and vice president of the South Carolina AIA and since 1976 has held a number of state, local and regional AIA positions.

LS3P, which has won numerous architectural awards, this year received honors for two Lowcountry design projects: Westvaco Corp.’s research facility in North Charleston and Newton Builders’ corporate office building in West Ashley. The Westvaco project features a three-story glass atrium connecting two separate research and development divisions. Newton Builders’ corporate facility, a former warehouse, is highlighted by a renovated interior accenting the building’s wood, steel, concrete and glass.

Among the firm’s current projects is the design of a mixed-use development in Wild Dunes, which will include 204 residential condominiums, 25,000 square feet of retail space and a restaurant, all of which will be blended with the resort’s existing conference center and the Boardwalk Inn. The condominiums will be housed in six multi-story buildings, with retail shops on the ground floors.

Penney sees LS3P pursuing more mixed-use projects. Also, sustainable architecture, in which architects design energy-efficient buildings that pose no harm to the environment, will become more predominant at the firm.

“Sustainability soon will be an expected part of what people look for in architecture,” Penney says.

Dennis Quick is senior staff writer for the Business Journal. E-mail him at dquick@crbj.com.

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