See the top 50 architects in a sortable league table

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The number of consultants who say they are worried about business prospects for the coming year is at its highest level since 2012, according to research by BD’s sister magazine Building.

Its annual Top 150 consultants survey revealed that for the first time since the London Olympics more firms felt pessimistic (25%) than optimistic (19%) about the next 12 months.

The Brexit impasse, worries about a stalling economy and concerns over the UK’s pipeline of infrastructure work have all combined to knock firms’ confidence.

There was some apparent good news, with the UK turnover of the industry’s biggest firms growing by a healthy 12% and the number of people they employed increasing, albeit more modestly, by 3.5%, to just shy of 75,000.

But the research revealed diminishing confidence that the years of growth can continue.

The chairman of architect Stride Treglown, David Hunter, told Building: “We’re holding our breath to see what happens. When it comes to projects getting to planning and construction stages, they’re just not going at the speed they should. We’re constantly having to push start dates further back.”

RIBA’s monthly Future Trends survey showed architects’ confidence in August remained flat, with a zero score only a slight improvement on the -3 recorded in July.

September’s Construction Purchasing Managers’ Index showed business confidence was at its lowest level since the global financial crisis and construction output falling.

Foster & Partners remains the country’s biggest architect, reporting 383 chartered architects on its payroll, followed by BDP and AHMM.

The top five architects in this year’s table all showed a year-on-year increase in staff numbers.

Top 50 Architects 2019
Rank UK architectural staffTotal UK chartered staffTotal UK staffOffices
2019 rank2018 rankFirmChartered architectsArchitectural technologistsNon-chartered / technical2018201920182019UKWorldwide
1 1 Foster + Partners 383 6 210 395 426 1,064 1,202 1 16
2 2 BDP3 348 0 124 529 586 878 980 6 7
3 3 Allford Hall Monaghan Morris 263 0 84 247 263 395 427 2 1
4 4 Allies and Morrison  182 0 124 179 187 344 349 4 1
5 7 Stride Treglown4 118 17 105 154 163 334 329 9 0
6 8= Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios 111 0 0 160 154 204 203 na 0
7 new Squire & Partners 107 0 59 111 107 153 166 1 0
8 8= TP Bennett 105 25 27 144 138 310 315 3 0
9 14 Aecom 97 10 160 2,767 2,743 6,054 6,769 42 630
10 10= AHR 94 3 57 125 123 308 305 8 2
11 10= EPR Architects  86 5 52 92 91 157 160 2 1
12 17 HTA Design 79 10 58 100 106 198 196 4 0
13 13 Broadway Malyan 77 na 76 89 77 256 256 4 8
14 new Pascall+Watson 72 11 90 94 83 207 193 2 3
15 24= Arup1  70 0 77 1,901 2,059 5,599 6,073 15 na
16 15 Levitt Bernstein6 67 0 27 81 67 137 124 2 0
17= new Jacobs 65 5 60 na 1,827 na 8,966 34 300
17= 20 Donald Insall Associates  65 0 13 60 65 123 129 8 0
19= 19 ADP Architecture 62 1 21 66 64 106 101 7 1
19= 22 3DReid 62 0 53 61 62 117 132 5 0
21 21 Fletcher Priest Architects 61 0 21 58 61 118 104 1 2
22 new Ryder Architecture 59 11 69 67 71 172 175 4 3
23 24= HLM 58 21 65 55 79 167 185 7 0
24 23 Mace 55 0 0 1,556 1,553 1,556 1,553 na na
25 28= NPS Group 46 5 44 202 185 727 533 18 0
26 27 Stockwool 45 4 11 53 49 77 68 1 0
27 new Rolfe Judd 44 1 24 53 58 88 104 2 2
28 30= Pick Everard 43 38 12 362 396 510 541 13 0
29= new Atkins Walters & Webster 42 11 13 56 54 92 85 3 0
29= 30= Aukett Swanke 42 na 29 53 47 106 94 1 8
31 44= LSI Architects 34 8 11 37 42 66 78 2 0
32= 30= ECE Group 32 12 30 47 51 85 90 3 0
32= 42 Pozzoni Architecture 32 17 13 51 49 73 72 2 0
34 38 R H Partnership Architects 31 2 10 33 33 61 51 3 0
35 43= GRID Architects 29 0 19 26 29 48 53 1 0
36 43= Mott MacDonald Group 28 137 15 3,697 3,647 7,115 7,242 38 135
37= new Arcadis 27 na 75 1,789 1,688 3,351 3,763 26 292
37= new Buttress Architects 27 5 6 28 32 39 43 1 0
39 44= Ridge and Partners 26 3 27 231 264 632 660 11 0
40= 37 P+HS Architects 25 17 23 36 43 63 74 3 0
40= 34 Holder Mathias  25 17 0 38 42 46 50 2 0
42 new Ingleton Wood 24 4 28 57 79 187 209 6 0
43 new Whittam Cox Architects  22 27 58 50 50 125 135 3 0
44 new Gray Baynes and Shew  16 1 0 24 25 26 27 2 0
45= new Pellings 14 0 2 81 88 139 143 5 0
45= new Novium 14 8 8 16 22 26 31 1 0
47= 48 Baily Garner 13 6 11 78 72 160 165 3 na
47= 35= Lewis & Hickey 13 10 0 30 26 60 53 5 1
49= new WSP2 12 2 50 na 1,208 7,191 8,100 57 456
49= new Chaplin Farrant Design Group 12 6 11 20 20 41 42 3 0

Methodology and notes

Close to 300 firms were contacted for this year’s Building Top Consultants Survey. They were sent a survey form asking for details on the number of chartered staff, non-chartered and technical staff, and domestic and worldwide fee incomes. Practices were also asked questions relating to: staff recruitment, wage patterns, margins, areas of work, and work expectations. 

All data in the tables are taken directly from firms’ replies. 

The survey does not claim to list all the top consultants, as it relies upon firms completing and returning the annual survey form. For a variety of reasons, firms sometimes decide not to take part. Only those firms completing and returning the survey form are included in the survey.  Firms having any questions about the survey, or wishing to be included in the 2020 survey, should contact Martin Hewes at Hewes & Associates: www.hewes-associates.com.  

NB: “New” is used to mean that the company was not in the 2018 Top 150 consultants table.

NB: A previous version of this table erroneously omitted AHR (ranked 10)

  1. Arup: Income data for 2019 is unaudited and provisional
  2. WSP: UK chartered total includes 1,193 other chartered, not identified in any questions
  3. BDP: Totals include other chartered staff
  4. Stride Treglown: Other engineers includes town planner, landscape architects and MCIAT staff
  5. Paragon Building Consultancy: 2018/19 figures take account of 2018 merger
  6. Levitt Bernstein: Income figures are estimates
  7. Price & Myers: Fee income for 2018 is estimated
  8. TowerEight: 2018 income is an estimate
  9. Robinson Low Francis: 2018 income is subject to audit
  10. Procom Construction Consultants: Fee income for 2019/20 projected as £5m
  11. Exigere Project Services: New company for 2019
  12. Black & White Engineering: Fee income for 2019 are estimates, based on seven months of data
  13. Iesis Group: Fee income for 2019 is estimated. July year end

Postscript

For the full report and tables see BD’s sister title, Building

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