Salt Lake City — Atlas Architects, a small and savvy firm that has made an outsized impact by transforming a declining swath of autobody shops and warehouses into a hip and walkable neighborhood, has been acquired by GSBS Architects, effective Dec. 31, 2024.
The acquisition includes Atlas’s name, portfolio, and reputation. The firm’s founder, Jason Foster, and three professional staff members have agreed to join GSBS.
“The combination of GSBS and Atlas uniquely aligns with both firms’ vision and values as diverse groups of talented, creative, and passionate people who seek to improve our communities and environment,” said Foster, who worked for GSBS for three years before leaving to start Atlas. “GSBS is the only firm where I knew I and my team would feel at home.”
“This isn’t a typical acquisition where we’re looking to add expertise in new product sectors,” said GSBS President and CEO Kevin Miller. “We aim to become even better at what we do well. Atlas and GSBS have done similar projects, and we work for some of the same clients. With the insight and inspiration of Jason’s team, we will deepen our expertise and our commitment to the communities we work in.”
Established in 2008, Atlas is known for pioneering the revitalization of Salt Lake City’s transit-oriented Central 9th neighborhood. It started with Building #1, housing Atlas’s offices and a coffee shop. Modern buildings for Spyhop Media Arts Center, the Salt Lake Bicycle Collective, Infinite Scale, and other businesses followed, along with rowhouses and multi-family structures, all centered around the Utah Transit Authority’s 900 South TRAX light rail station.
“Atlas has made a huge impact on the Salt Lake community in a relatively short time, and we’re excited to gain the skills, talents, passions, perspectives, insights, and experience of an innovative and focused firm,” said Miller. “Combining with GSBS provides the Atlas team with the resources of a larger firm, collaboration with new colleagues, and participation in a wider range of projects and product sectors.”
Founded in 1978, GSBS Architects employs nearly 100 professional and support staff in offices in Salt Lake City and Fort Worth, Texas. GSBS provides a wide range of creative and consulting services, including architecture, landscape architecture, interior design, planning and urban design, sustainability, and experiential graphic design.
Long known for its work to make buildings and places more sustainable, GSBS’s work includes iconic structures such as Salt Lake City’s Public Safety Building, the Natural History Museum of Utah, and the Utah Olympic Oval, built for the 2002 Olympic Winter Games, and still setting records as the “Fastest Ice on Earth.” GSBS recently added offices and locker rooms to the Oval for the National Hockey League’s new Utah Hockey Club franchise.
In addition to Foster, Atlas architects Cindy Bithell and Ashley Iordanov, and associate Trayce Webb will move to GSBS. All will work on both Atlas and GSBS projects.
“We’re excited to engage the Atlas team across the full life cycle of GSBS projects, from acquisition and design to execution and construction,” Miller said.
GSBS’s acquisition of Atlas is effective Dec. 31, 2024, with Atlas staff completing their move to GSBS’s Salt Lake City offices on Monday, Jan. 6, 2025.