Skidmore, Owings & Merrill history

1937: The New York City office is opened.

1939: John Merrill joins the firm, prompting a name change.

By 1950 the firm had grown to include seven partners, one of whom was Gordon Bunshaft.

By 1952 the company numbered 14 partners and over 1,000 employees, with offices in Chicago, New York, San Francisco, and Portland, Oregon.

Completed in 1955, the Istanbul Hilton was hailed as one of the great architectural and interior design achievements of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill.

1961: SOM receives the first Firm Award presented by the American Institute of Architects (AIA).

In 1962 Skidmore, Owings & Merrill designed the buildings for the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

In 1963 Meier formed his own firm.

In Stanley Tigerman…those of George Fred Keck; Skidmore, Owings & Merrill; and Harry M. Weese—before starting his own practice in 1964.

In 1965 the firm designed the Brunswick Building in Chicago, the entire community at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and the library and museum at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York.

Early on he received critical acclaim for the Smith House (1967) in Darien, Connecticut, the first of…

1974: SOM designs the Sears Roebuck Tower in Chicago, then the tallest building in the world.

In 1977 the firm won an important commission to design the National Commercial Bank in Jidda, Saudi Arabia.

The SOM Foundation was created in 1979 to promote architecture nationally by giving fellowships to students.

The first traveling fellowships were offered in 1981 and carried larger stipends than most others at the time.

Completed in 1982, this project was the last of the firm's historic designs and signaled the end of an era.

In 1985 the board again expanded, with seven SOM members and up to eleven outside members.

1986: First overseas office is opened in London.

The opening of the Charnley House took place at the end of September 1987.

Gross receipts peaked in 1989 at $157 million.

Throughout the years in which the Institute operated, first as part of the SOM Foundation and since 1990 as a legally separate entity, the Foundation itself continued awarding student fellowships every year.

In 1991 the position of chairman was assumed by David Childs, a long-time employee at Skidmore, Owings & Merrill.

The most conspicuous was a series of charrettes, organized by Bruce Graham and Stanley Tigerman, to come up with ideas for the proposed 1993 World’s Fair in Chicago.

The Charnley House was sold in April 1995 and funds were used to expand the Foundation’s core awards program.

In 1996, the Foundation announced a major expansion to include new awards in the fields of interior design, urban design and planning, mechanical and electrical engineering, and structural engineering.

…the American architectural firm of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, of Chicago, Illinois, it has 88 stories and reaches a height of 1,380 feet (420.5 metres). At the time of its official opening in January 1999, it was one of the tallest buildings in the world—exceeded in height only by the…

In 2003, SOM was in the running to recapture its position as the designer of the world's tallest building.

As of December 2004, the Taipei 101 Tower, at 1,674 feet, ranked as the tallest occupied building.

Named after real estate developer Donald Trump, the 98-story building was designed by architect Adrian Smith of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM). It was completed in 2009 and ranks among the tallest residential buildings in the world.

The SOM Foundation currently offers five awards:Research Prize 2018–PresentIn 2018, the SOM Foundation introduced the Research Prize—an evolution of the former SOM Prize and SOM Travel Fellowship programs—to cultivate new ideas and meaningful research that addresses the critical issues of our time.