The Value of Relationships: A DES + FWA Collaboration Story

Some of the best decisions on a project happen before design begins. At Framework, we recognize that some projects call for expertise beyond what our team carries in-house. When that happens, we bring in partners who have spent their careers developing that specialized knowledge. The goal is simple: give our clients the right team for the work.

"Everything we do comes back to our mission: making a visible difference through design, process, and commitment to service," says Framework co-founder Jeremy Koomler. "Serving a client well can mean bringing in a partner who has spent five decades mastering what their project needs. If a partner makes the outcome better, we want them at the table."

Our partnership with DES is a good example. DES is a multidisciplinary firm headquartered in Redwood City, California, with offices in San Francisco and Austin. Over 53 years, the firm has grown into an established full-service design practice in Silicon Valley, working across architecture, interior design, planning, engineering and sustainability for clients in technology, education, life sciences, healthcare and real estate development. Healthcare and lab planning have been part of that work from the beginning, and DES has more than 50 years of experience in both.

Our relationship with DES began without a project on the table. A mutual consultant introduced the two firms several years ago, and Urban Land Institute events and networking coffees kept putting us in the same room. Over time, we got to know each other's work and approach.

DES saw Framework as a firm rooted in Austin that understood how to move projects through the city. Our team recognized DES's specialized experience and collaborative culture. By the time the first pursuit came along, we already had a foundation of trust.

On projects where specialized lab or healthcare expertise is needed, Framework serves as architect of record and DES joins the team as our design partner. That arrangement has helped both firms win projects, including a surgery center and a large clinical laboratory.

The combination works because each firm brings something different to the table. DES contributes deep experience in lab planning and healthcare design, while Framework brings project management and planning experience and a strong understanding of the Austin market. We continue to pursue opportunities together, including recent efforts at Texas universities and elsewhere.

• 

• 

• 

Renderings of the work DES and Framework completed for their healthcare client.

The value of the partnership also comes down to the people involved. David Hronek, who leads DES's science and technology practice, brings 43 years of built environment experience, including seven years at Earl Walls Associates, the lab design consultancy Jonas Salk hired to plan the laboratories at the Salk Institute, widely considered to be the birthplace of modern lab planning. His project experience includes conservation laboratories for the Getty Museum and work on the CDC and NIH campuses.

Ask David what makes a partnership work, and his answer starts with communication and compatibility: partners with "similar approaches to how they do projects and clients and work." Decades as a consultant moving between teams also taught him the importance of flexibility—adapting to each firm's way of working rather than imposing his own.

He is equally direct about why DES continues to team with Framework. "They do good work, and they have good relationships with a lot of the folks in Austin," he says. "It's all about the people you know." That approach extends to how DES works with its own partners. Even with seven service lines in-house, the firm structures its teams around what serves the client best, including stepping aside when a client has a preferred engineer. For both firms, knowing when to bring the right people to the table is part of doing the job well.

The relationship has produced a few unexpected connections, too. On one lab project, Jeremy and David discovered that one of Jeremy's former business partners had been David's college classmate. In an industry built on relationships, those connections have a way of resurfacing.

The timing is also right for this kind of collaboration. Austin is among the U.S. markets seeing significant growth in life sciences venture capital funding, according to CBRE's 2026 life sciences market rankings. That investment is translating into demand for labs, clinics and research space—projects that require specialized planning from the earliest stages.

For Framework, the value of partnerships comes down to knowing when another team's expertise can make a project better. Building relationships with firms that share our commitment to client service gives us another way to bring the right expertise to the table when our clients need it.

.