By Joshua Burd
Gensler has announced several key moves in its Morristown office, including the appointment of a new co-managing director to succeed one of its longtime leaders in the state.
Becky Button, who has spent a decade with the global design firm, will work in partnership with Reid Brockmeier, its co-managing director in the local office for nearly 30 years. She will succeed Brenda Nyce-Taylor, who is retiring as a principal and co-managing director in Morristown after more than 40 years in the industry.
Additionally, Gensler has promoted veteran designer Roger Smith to principal.
“Brenda’s contributions will be sorely missed at Gensler,” Brockmeier said. “We are so grateful for her outstanding commitment to our office and the design industry as a whole, and for raising the standard for exceptional design in today’s world. We are thrilled to have Becky join our office as a co-managing director, continuing Gensler’s focus on client service excellence. Her promotion, along with Roger Smith’s appointment to principal, showcase our exciting growth as we strive to create a better world through the power of design.”
The firm said Button, a studio director in the New York office and a global leader guiding the firm’s client relationships, has led projects for high-profile law, tech, professional services and real estate users such as Bloomberg LP, Marsh & McLennan, Lazard, Apple, Netflix and Tishman Speyer. In 2014, she earned a spot on Engineering News-Record New York’s Top 20 Under 40 professionals in the industry, while she holds several key certifications and degrees from the State University of New York at New Paltz and the New York School of Interior Design.
Smith, for his part, is a design director who has worked on projects such as M Station in Morristown, the renovation of Newark’s Gateway complex and Valley Bank’s new headquarters in Morristown. He also serves as a member of Gensler’s Global Race and Diversity Committee and is co-chair of the Center for Research on Equity and the Built Environment, overseeing the firm’s research on addressing systemic racism, unconscious bias and social justice.
Smith has received the 2020 AIA New Jersey Distinguished Service Award and is an adjunct professor at the New Jersey Institute of Technology’s Hillier College of Architecture and Design, the Michael Graves College at Kean University and the Weitzman School of Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania. He holds a master of architecture from the Weitzman School.
