Design Development

How do you add 10 stories to a building without adding a single square foot of floor area?Brian McFarland and his team did exactly that at Soma at 25 Water in New York. Brian is a Principal at CetraRuddy Architecture, and he calls Soma the largest completed office-to-residential conversion in the U.S. to date.The building was a late-1960s back office for a bank, built for computers, not people. Brick, very little glass, and a floor plate about 150 by 275 feet. In New York, every habitable room has to be within 30 feet of a window.So the team cut two inner courts into the building for light and air. Then they used the zoning rules to move floor area that no longer counted up to the roof.Soma started as a 22-story, 1.1 million square foot building. After 10 new stories, it is still 1.1 million square feet. In Brian’s words, it’s “all about the textual definition of floor area in the zoning resolution. It has nothing to do with the real world.”In this episode, Brian and Rens dig into:• How Soma at 25 Water added 10 stories with zero new floor area, and why the zoning text, not a tape measure, sets the number.• How small deductions add up, from the extra 8 inches of a 44-inch stair to the recreation space a conversion has to provide.• The “Malkovich floor” at Lirio: a 3-foot-tall space that keeps a building’s plumbing out of an MTA rail control center below.• How the 467-m tax abatement and City of Yes pushed New York’s development market into conversions.• Why most of CetraRuddy’s work is as of right, and how New York differs from cities that run on entitlements.• Brian’s path from project architect to partner, four years leading VOA’s New York building practice, and his picks: The Search for Form in Art and Architecture by Eliel Saarinen and the Thomistic Institute podcast.The lesson underneath the episode is bigger than conversions:Know the rules better than anyone else at the table.Brian’s team didn’t find 10 stories by making the building bigger on paper. They found them by reading how the zoning resolution defines floor area. That reading turned a 22-story building into a 32-story one with the same floor area.Sometimes the space you need is already written into the rules.Thanks for being part of the Design Development community.New episodes drop every Wednesday, featuring leaders across real estate, design, and construction.The goal is simple: learn from how great people think, lead, make decisions, navigate setbacks, and create opportunity.There is no single path to success.Careers are not linear.The lessons are in the story.Subscribe so you don’t miss the next conversation.Follow us on LinkedIn, Instagram & YouTubeFind out more at https://h-o.engineering/podcasts/Let’s go.

What if the biggest misconception about senior living is that it’s where life winds down?Walter Ramos has spent his career moving between government, law, hospitals and senior living. Today he is President & CEO of Rogerson Communities, a nonprofit that has been providing housing and care for older adults since 1860.On paper, the path looks scattered. It isn’t.It started with a college internship in a U.S. Senator’s office, working on housing, health care and urban living. Walter says every role since has followed that same thread: housing for people, health care for people, and a good quality of life. Even the law degree came from the thread. Lawyers kept telling him he couldn’t write legislation because he wasn’t one, so he became one.That thread shapes how he sees senior living. In his words, “Senior living isn’t a place that is the end of the line.” It’s the next stage of a productive, enjoyable life, with a higher level of care there when it’s needed.Rogerson builds around that idea. Every community, affordable or market rate, keeps the same core: a private room, shared spaces, and a life that continues the way the resident has always lived it. Walter says about half of Rogerson’s stock is affordable, built with philanthropic, local, state and federal support.Now Rogerson is planning to grow. Its five-year plan calls for adding 1,000 new places for older adults to live. Walter explains that doubling the places means doubling the infrastructure behind them, and he talks about what makes that hard, starting with land.In this episode, Walter and Rens dig into:· Why senior living is the next stage of life, not the end of it, and how a career across government, law and hospitals led Walter there.· How affordable and market-rate communities share the same core, and how continuing care retirement communities let residents stay in one place as their care needs change.· Why Rogerson builds in neighborhoods like Chinatown, so people can age in their community instead of moving to the suburbs.· Rogerson’s five-year plan to add 1,000 new places, and why the infrastructure has to double with it.· Why finding affordable land is one of the biggest constraints in Boston, and why Rogerson does not buy a property and flip it.· Why leading starts with listening, why a CEO’s first year is the most vulnerable, and the book Walter recommends, Being Mortal by Atul Gawande.The lesson underneath the episode is bigger than senior living:Anchor to the mission and let everything else move.Walter’s roles changed from government to law to hospitals to senior living. The thread never did. Rogerson has held to the same purpose since 1860, and Walter says what it builds is meant to stay for older adults in perpetuity.Sometimes what looks like the end of the line is just the next stage of the same road.Thanks for being part of the Design Development community.New episodes drop every Wednesday, featuring leaders across real estate, design, and construction.The goal is simple: learn from how great people think, lead, make decisions, navigate setbacks, and create opportunity.There is no single path to success.Careers are not linear.The lessons are in the story.Subscribe so you don’t miss the next conversation.Follow us on LinkedIn, Instagram & YouTubeFind out more at https://h-o.engineering/podcasts/Let’s go.

Kyle Touchstone, Raleigh’s economic development director, brings a firsthand view of how cities prepare for explosive growth. He explores Raleigh’s talent-driven appeal, university pipeline, affordability pressures, developer-led corporate opportunities, and plans for downtown, sports, entertainment, and transit. He also explains why incentives are merely the “dessert” and how early collaboration makes development more predictable.

Founders can run a real estate firm on heroics for a while. At some point, the business needs a system.In this episode of Design Development, Leslie Cohen, Founder and Principal of Ops Alchemy, talks about strengthening operations, reducing founder dependence, and preparing a business for growth and leadership transitions.Leslie shares how she approached becoming the first COO at Samuels & Associates: establishing a cadence around the operating budget, listening to people throughout the organization, and clarifying decision ownership among partners. She also explains how she diagnoses operational challenges today and helps teams implement improvements.In this episodeRecognizing when a real estate firm has outgrown the way it operates.Giving operations dedicated attention as the company grows.Defining roles and decision ownership before assessing whether people are in the right seats.Understanding the communication problems created when founders bypass management.Aligning operational improvements with the founder’s goals and succession plans.Starting with the most important pain points and documenting workflows, including tenant introduction through lease execution.Using standard operating procedures to support onboarding, training, and consistent execution.Connecting operational improvements to financial results and sharing the operating company’s financial picture with the team.Building quality management through defined processes and standards while preserving independent judgment.Documenting processes before introducing automation or AI.About Leslie CohenLeslie Cohen is the Founder and Principal of Ops Alchemy, a consulting firm that helps growth-stage companies scale by aligning people, process and profit. Its approach: “We focus on the business so you can focus in the business.”With more than 30 years of experience in real estate, Leslie brings an operator’s perspective, having built her career from developer to Chief Operating Officer. She partners with founders and leadership teams to transform organizations in a growth mode or period of transition, creating operational clarity, systems and structure.Before launching Ops Alchemy, Leslie served as COO for Davis and COO for Samuels & Associates, where she executed firm-wide strategy. Known for translating vision into execution, she has led organizations through periods of growth and change while strengthening culture and driving financial performance.A respected industry leader, Leslie has served as President of CREW Boston and NAIOP MA. Her numerous honors include Bisnow Power Women in Commercial Real Estate, BBJ Women Who Mean Business, Globe Street Women of Influence, the CREW Boston Leadership Award and BBJ 40 Under 40.Leslie has a BSCE from Tufts University and an MBA from Babson College. She resides in Brookline, Massachusetts, with her husband and two children.Connect with LeslieOps AlchemyLeslie Cohen on LinkedInResources mentionedEOS and the Accountability ChartThe Great Game of Business by Jack Stack and Bo BurlinghamWalker WebcastAdam Grant’s podcastsThanks for being part of the Design Development community.New episodes drop every Wednesday, featuring leaders across real estate, design, and construction.The goal is simple: learn from how great people think, lead, make decisions, navigate setbacks, and create opportunity.There is no single path to success.Careers are not linear.The lessons are in the story.Subscribe so you don’t miss the next conversation.Follow us on LinkedIn, Instagram & YouTubeFind out more at https://h-o.engineering/podcasts/Let’s go.

Matt Pierce, founder of PIERCE Property Services and Building Envelope Group, shares his journey from storefront window cleaning to a 120-person building-services company. He explores turning field observations into Lifecycle360, using maintenance data to protect properties, spotting growth opportunities inside existing businesses, and helping established contractors expand without sacrificing their brands or independence.

Rens Hayes, structural engineer and co-founder of H&O Structural Engineering, shares how due diligence on his family’s business reshaped his approach to ownership. He explores engineering enterprise value, balancing freedom with growth, building a trusted partnership, creating predictable sales systems, and hiring an executive team. The conversation also covers risk, reinvestment, customer journeys, and scaling without sacrificing independence.

Jon Weiss, a fourth-generation builder and B2K Development leader, shares how family roots shaped his career and how B2K unlocked Long Beach’s long-stalled Superblock. They explore local approvals, housing shortages, construction costs, early preconstruction, community buy-in, and B2K’s expansion into Connecticut, New Jersey, and South Florida.

Patrick Carino, VP of Development at The NRP Group and founder of DealNav, brings experience from over $1 billion in CBRE transactions. He explores why capitalization can be tougher than finding deals, how institutional committees differ from family offices, and why relationships and judgment still matter. Patrick also recounts walking away from a flawed Westchester project and explains how specialization helps NRP scale.

Rens Hayes IV, co-founder of H+O Structural Engineering and a certified value growth advisor, discusses aligning structural design with business strategy. Topics include the H+O Cost Index, proprietary data, hidden construction savings, open-book management, and adaptable design. He also explores Revit automation, buildable digital models, AI-powered site planning, and the future of risk-sharing in construction.

Ben Kasdan, a KTGY principal with 20+ years in multifamily and mixed-use design, explores what makes housing work today. They discuss the end of the amenities arms race, smarter coworking and pet spaces, efficiency benchmarks, pools, in-unit laundry, and the hidden complexity of office-to-residential conversions. Kasdan also shares how KTGY’s R&D studio tests ideas before they reach real projects.