Lyda Swinerton Builders

From San Francisco to San Antonio

By Jennifer Hiller

Established in Texas in 1960, Lyda Swinerton Builders has helped shape the skyline of San Antonio with signature projects such as the 1.1 million sq.-ft. Alamodome and the Tower of Americas, the city's tallest structure.

But the company also has worked across Texas, completing more than 450 projects that range from Wal-Mart Supercenters to hotel resort and spa facilities. "The majority of our work is in Austin, San Antonio and Houston, but we also do some work in Dallas, Santa Fe and Albuquerque and the Rio Grande Valley," said Leland Rocchio, business development representative.

The company ranked 16 on Texas Construction's list of the state's top contractors.

Lyda Swinerton is a commercial general contractor specializing in commercial office building, hotel, retail centers, corporate facilities, institutional and hospital construction. Services include consulting, design-build, estimating, scheduling, system analysis and value engineering.

Lyda Swinerton is the Texas subsidiary of the San Francisco-based Swinerton Inc. The company was founded in California in 1888 and handled $1.9 billion in 2004. Expansions have included offices in Denver; Bellevue, Wash.; Portland; Honolulu; Salt Lake City; and Sacramento.

Repeat clients have helped fuel a large volume of hotel and corporate work over the last few years.

For example, construction of the $18.8 million Security Service Federal Credit Union headquarters in 2000 in San Antonio helped the firm win another $8 million in contracts for eight credit union branch projects in Texas and Colorado, Rocchio said. Five of those branches have completed and three are under construction.

Similarly, current projects include the $66 million, 500-guestroom Hyatt Lost Pines Resort in Bastrop. The project, which is expected to be completed in 2006, includes guest rooms, ballrooms, meeting facilities, a restaurant and bar, separate clubhouse and spa, as well as a lazy river.

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In 2004, Lyda Swinerton completed the Hyatt Wild Oak Ranch for the Chicago-based Hyatt Development. The 288-unit resort, located 20 mi. northwest of San Antonio, is situated on 40 acres. It opened in August and is the first phase of a two-phase project.

The project included the construction of 10 separate buildings associated with earthwork and underground utilities, hardscape, pools and landscaping. There are two, three-story timeshare buildings, a general store and two sales buildings as well as a children's camp. The design is reminiscent of historic Texas ranch architecture with its limestone exteriors and rustic wood beams.

Lyda Swinerton was established in San Antonio in 1960, which is its base for Texas operations, and also has an office in Houston. The Texas offices do a combined volume of about $200 million in projects annually.

The San Francisco-based headquarters initially maintained a group of partnerships and corporations to provide construction services on both a national and international level. In 1960, the company began to consolidate its operations. Swinerton Inc. was formed later as the holding company to supply for these operations in order to supply them with centralized corporate support services.

And in 2002, the Texas offices became a wholly owned subsidiary of Swinerton Inc. in 2002.

The company is 100 percent employee owned, which company officials say contributes to a sense of pride and attention to detail.

The company expects to do more work in the growing higher education and health-care markets in the next few years as well as more retail work in San Antonio, where that market has been especially active, Rocchio said.

Projects to be completed this year include the demolition of a Kelly USA building in San Antonio and the construction of a $9.9 million, 330,000-sq.-ft. structure for the company. The project will include tilt-wall construction of the warehouse and flex office complex on a 25-acre site.