Dee Brown Inc.

Refining the Art of Masonry

Headquartered in the Dallas area, Dee Brown Inc.'s best calling card is a swath of high-profile buildings in downtown Dallas' northern and western sections, proving it is a heavyweight in masonry and stone construction.

The firm ranked 28 on Texas Construction's list of the state's top specialty contractors.

They are some of the best-known addresses in Big D: The Morton Myerson Symphony Center, CityPlace Center: the Hotel Crescent and Complex, the Nasher Sculpture Center, the American Airlines Center, the Federal Reserve Bank, the Dallas Museum of Art and the Wyndham Anatole Hotel.

The full-service company specializes in conventional masonry, panelized masonry, glass block and reinforced masonry. Dee Brown is a frequent preferred subcontractor for the construction of high-end corporate offices, luxury residential addresses, civic arts complexes, professional sports venues, hospitals, churches and religious institutions.

With the development of numerous stone cladding systems to its credit, the firm continues to fulfill some of the largest masonry projects in demand in its markets. The systems require an equal expertise in the installation of hand-set interior and exterior granite, marble, limestone and travertine projects.

Dee Brown has also taken stone work to another level by increasingly landing indoor artistic and outdoor landscaping stone contracts.

"Masonry is an art and always has been," said executive vice president Rob Barnes of the new niche market.

The merger of art and masonry by Dee Brown is best illustrated by the Nasher Sculpture Center, constructed of Italian travertine and South African granite. The 55,000-sq.-ft. art museum looks like urban ruins with six stone walls supporting a roof structure letting in natural light.

The company's versatility is one of many factors attributing to its success, according to Barnes. The company consistently ranks among the top three masonry firms in the nation based on revenue.

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"Our longevity, experience and attention to trying to do things the right way the first time and attention to the schedule is a distinction for us compared to other masonry companies," he said.

"We've done just about anything that you can hang, set or lay."

A stalwart in the masonry field, the company got there by racking up 50 years of service as of this year. From a basic masonry company in 1955, the founder, C. DeWitt Brown Jr., had big plans for the future. He applied modern business management principles to a hard-working commitment to quality, product familiarity, innovation and customer satisfaction. His friendship with Ralph B. Rogers, founder and chairman of Texas Industries Inc., a large Dallas construction materials company, paved the way for success.

Together, Brown and his mentor Rogers created a partnership that took masonry to a new professional level. Brown was a journeyman bricklayer with some formal business education from Southern Methodist University, a rare combination.

With the company's reputation being forged at area construction sites, Brown focused on strict cost-accounting system and long-range business plans. Meanwhile, due to his drive to stay on top of technological advances, Dee's son-in-law Robert V. "Buddie" Barnes Jr. began to develop the company enterprise in the stone and granite cladding work in demand for the high-rise commercial buildings springing up in the late 1970s.

That led to other specialties. The company fabricated metal trusses, attaching them to anchoring systems and mounting stone cladding with insulation and gutters to the trusses then shipped them across the country. A similar approach with stone-clad trusses measuring 30-ft. long and 6-ft. high was used to construct 311 South Wacker in Chicago, the world's tallest concrete building.

Buddie Barnes took over the company in 1990 with the same fervor and commitment he had learned under its founder. Today, Dee Brown remains a family business with a third-generation relative, Rob Barnes, leading the company to the next plateau.

Dee Brown currently has 25 foremen, 30 administrative staff and approximately 300 field personnel in the Dallas market. Additional departments provide estimating, project management, drafting and field management, while its stone fabrication shop supports any stone modifications and finishing work. Revenues amount to about $45 to $50 million annually.

No job is too large or small. Dee Brown takes on special projects such as repairs, restoration and remodeling. The company dispatches five 1-ton trucks to provide these services. Its restoration of the 1896 Old Red Courthouse clocktower in Dallas features the addition of a steel system placed in the existing tower's base, encased with sandstone and granite.

Other Texas projects of note are the Gaylord Texan Hotel & Resort, Grapevine; the Ameriquest Field, Arlington; Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, Terminal D; Frisco City Hall; Dallas' NorthPark Center; Transco Tower, Houston; Marathon Oil Tower, Houston; and Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Children, Dallas.

Outside the state, the company's work includes the 70-story 900 North Michigan Avenue in Chicago, the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles and the IBM Tower in Atlanta.

Industry awards won by Dee Brown include three International Excellence in Masonry awards, one for the J. Paul Getty Museum in 2001, one for the American Airlines Center in 2002, and most recently for the clubhouse at Tournament Players Club golf course at Craig Ranch in McKinney in 2004.