4 min read January 2024 — Robert Shemwell, Senior Principal of Overland Partners, sat down with Invest: to discuss the allure of San Antonio’s quality of life and doing business, design’s role in communicating this to the world and San Antonians and more. “The rest of the nation could learn from a lot of us in San Antonio,” he says. “We work in a lot of different cities and circumstances. I constantly think about how San Antonio’s diverse community influences stakeholder engagement for the better, bringing unique ideas and perspectives forward to inspire positive change.”
How has Overland Partners grown in recent years?
Over the past two years, we have been expanding our footprint across Texas, opening an office in Dallas with a focus on sports and entertainment as well as building out a highly talented design team of architects, urban designers, and interior designers to serve clients across geographies and sectors including commercial/hospitality, education, non-profit, civic/cultural and residential. Our investment in the North Texas market was further solidified with our recent purchase of a building we are renovating for our new offices there. That has led to a series of relationships and opportunities we have today.
We are leveraging the foundation and reputation we built in San Antonio to expand into some very different markets that are larger with higher velocity. Overland’s unique approach to architectural design that prioritizes our clients’ mission, vision, and values to guide collaboration and design-thinking has opened new doors for our firm. Overland’s clients are looking for genuine partnership, innovative thinking and design solutions that are not only beautiful but are reflective of their brand, perform well, and deliver positive, sustainable impact for people and our planet. These values have led to significant growth for Overland, doubling our headcount over the past year.
The rest of the nation could learn a lot from us in San Antonio. We work in a lot of different cities and circumstances. I constantly think about how San Antonio’s diverse community influences stakeholder engagement for the better, bringing unique ideas and perspectives forward to inspire positive change. I believe San Antonio is a role model for healthy community engagement and civic pride. Working on projects around the world, I’ve gained a much greater appreciation for San Antonio and how the community approaches civic topics and debate.
What are San Antonio’s most pressing infrastructural needs?
One of the main functions of government is to create an environment for good things to happen. The key story for San Antonio is exemplified in the River Walk. San Antonio invested in a piece of infrastructure that has catalyzed so many opportunities for the city. It has continued to be expanded, and you can see how the greenway has benefited from it. Now we are seeing the positive ripple effects with tandem components that reimagine things like the Broadway Corridor, which is a major north/south artery through downtown San Antonio. Projects to make it a more pedestrian-friendly, beautiful, and hospitable thoroughfare are underway. The Complete Streets initiative being done around the Alamo will be very important for the community. These are enormous public investments happening within a few blocks of one another that will catapult downtown San Antonio to its next level. We will have bragging rights equal to other major cities. This sets us up for even more opportunities and is making San Antonio more interesting and appealing to the next generation. We have an advantage in that we have all kinds of housing that is affordable and available. We must ensure we can continue to maintain that.
What is San Antonio’s design community prioritizing when it comes to sustainability and regenerative projects?
We are very fortunate to have a forward-looking design community. Several firms in the city were very early adopters or participants in the USGBC, and now the International Living Future Institute continues to raise the bar for regenerative design innovation, which Overland embraced early on and is actively involved in. We are doing a project in Florida right now that will be the first net-zero designated living community in the United States that will host a restaurant, water projects and our campus. We are also doing a project in Utah targeting full Living Building Certification. We will continue to see this going forward. The irony is that the projects are coming from San Antonio but are for other places; we are working to make San Antonio the host of these projects. A great example of this is the new UTSA School of Data Science downtown which just achieved LEED Gold certification and is the first LEED certified building for UTSA. Overland, along with our design-build partners, worked closely with UTSA stakeholders to achieve this ambitious milestone. It sets a precedent and trajectory for high-performing, sustainable design on future projects.
What does demand for your services look like in San Antonio today?
We are not necessarily a good barometer for a specific market because we tend to be involved in such a wide variety of projects. We are largely selling strategic problem solving in a sustainable and beautiful way. This does not lead to a lot of commodity work. We do some multifamily housing, but it is usefully connected with a more complex project. For example, it could be a very interesting mixed-use project that includes multifamily housing. In that area of strategic problem solving where the commodity solution does not work, we are seeing a ton of demand. There is a high demand throughout the different sectors. We are doing a lot of hospitality work right now, which has felt incredible because we are learning things about human dynamics and what makes a narrative and story come to life that design supports and amplifies. We are seeing those attributes show up across the board. I have a saying in the office that everything is hospitality; banks are trying to become coffee shops, colleges are trying to become coworking places and workplaces are trying to become learning experiences. Our work, specifically in higher education and hospitality, shows us how those dynamics work, which is very appealing and powerful for a variety of the projects we are seeing.
If you can create space for an affordable, wonderful, great place to be that is dynamic and diverse, you will win in the future. That is where San Antonio has an X-Factor. Any list of unique cities in the United States includes San Antonio. There are several cities that bought into the notion of building the same building over and over again. Airports used to capture the unique spirit of their city, and now they are becoming more generic. Cities are doing the same; they are becoming disappointingly formulaic and unhealthy.
What are your outlook and priorities for Overland Partners for the next two to three years?
We are celebrating the fact that San Antonio is an international city rich with cultural soul and authenticity and bringing it to the world. The new Curio Collection by Hilton hotel currently under construction at Hemisfair Park will showcase incredible uniqueness through the legacy of its story, pulling specifics of San Antonio’s culture and native ecology into the design and guest experience. We have always focused on creating places that connect people to the landscape and each other in meaningful, memorable ways that promote wellbeing and care for the Earth. We are finding more and more clients who share these values across all market sectors. Our work with international experts, consultants, designers, and the power of technology to connect with stakeholders around the world opens up unlimited possibilities for innovation and best practices we can draw back to our home, creating sustainable design that contributes to the urban fabric and a thriving culture for San Antonio and the region.
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