The Urbanization & Future of Downtown

Spire is a privately-held commercial real estate services company that has provided specialized commercial real estate solutions since 1989. Today, Spire offers property management, project leasing, project management, and investment advisory services. Our comprehensive, creative approach to real estate has become the hallmark of our success. Rather than loosening our standards to become the largest real estate services company; instead, we desire to be the best, offering a level of service and success that cannot be matched.

Kim Butler leads the leasing efforts for HALL Group’s HALL Park, a 2.5 million-square-foot, 17-building office park in Frisco and previously KPMG Plaza at HALL Arts, a 500,000 square-foot Dallas Arts District office tower. Butler is also a member of the HALL Group development team. Butler has more than 35 years of commercial real estate experience in Dallas – 25 of which were at Transwestern, where she was consistently a top producer and held several executive roles for the company. Actively involved in the Dallas commercial real estate community, Butler has received numerous awards and accolades, including the Commercial Real Estate Women’s (CREW) Outstanding Achievement Award, Transwestern’s inaugural Founder’s Award and the North Texas Commercial Association of Realtors’ (NTCAR) prestigious Stemmons Service Award, the highest honor from the industry group. Butler currently serves on the executive committee and board of directors of The Real Estate Council (TREC). She is also an active member of NAIOP, NTCAR, CREW, the Dallas Arts District and Downtown Dallas, Inc., and has previously held board positions with each. Butler serves on the advisory council of the Rawls College of Business at Texas Tech University, and previously served on the associate board of the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University. She actively mentors both students and young professionals. Butler’s civic and charitable activities revolve around her family and First United Methodist Church – Dallas. Butler holds a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Texas Tech University and a Master of Business Administration from Southern Methodist University.

Anything uptown and urban in real estate is Jack Gosnell’s forte. Jack is an Executive Vice President with CBRE | UCR Urban in Dallas. His arrival prompted the development of our Urban division – formed to pursue urban redevelopment for mixed-use projects in the urban core. The principal focus of Jack’s energy has turned to adaptive re-use and redevelopment of urban cores. He is active in the redevelopment of Downtown Dallas. In 2016, Jack received the Stemmons Service Award, the highest award and honor given in the commercial real estate industry in Dallas by The North Texas Commercial Association of Realtors (NTCAR). Prior to CBRE | UCR, Jack began his real estate career in specialty retail leasing and commercial sales in 1972 with real estate legend Henry S. Miller, Jr. There he worked on leasing assignments with Turtle Creek Village and Old Town Village, which were prototypes of denser urban centers such as Mockingbird Station and West Village. He was Henry S. Miller, Jr.’s assistant during the acquisition of Highland Park Village in 1975. Gosnell began moving toward the urban core when he established his own business in 1978. He moved his focus from specialty retail to a multi-tiered approach to real estate. He assembled five major blocks in Uptown, which included the land for One McKinney Place, The Residence on McKinney and the Worthington. He was instrumental in assembling much of the land currently known as the State Thomas area in Uptown. During the 80’s and 90’s, Gosnell brokered over 200 building sales and over 300 leases south of Northwest Highway, 75 percent of the leases being restaurants. At one time in the 90’s, Gosnell had brokered 65 percent of Uptown/Downtown’s 145 restaurants. These include: 8.0 Bar, Meddlesome Moth, Taverna, The Common Table, Fedora, Asian Mint, The Knox Street Pub, The Idle Rich Pub, Iron Cactus, Perry’s Steakhouse & Grille, Palomino, Wild Salsa, Capital Grille, Dallas Chop House, Ocean Prime, Dee Lincoln’s Tasting Room, Pho Colonial, Stephan Pyles’ Stampede 66, FT 33, Ascension Coffee, Del Frisco’s Double Eagle Steakhouse, Katy Trail Ice House, the Rustic, Mutts Cantina, Mesero, Moxie, Shelby County Café, OAK, Mudhen, Adelmo’s and Shake Shack to name a few. Gosnell brought Forest City to Dallas to redevelop the notable Mercantile Bank building, the Continental building and the historic Wilson Building as a downtown mixed-use complex. CBRE | UCR Urban will lease the retail component and is active in the retail reemergence of the downtown Central Business District (CBD). He has chaired the Retail Recruitment Committee for Downtown Dallas, Inc. (DDI) and is working on a leasing plan for the Specialty Retail District in Downtown Dallas. Gosnell’s current projects include 1401 Elm in downtown, McKinney & Olive in Uptown, The Union, and The Farmers Market privatization. 1401 Elm is a landmark Skidmore tower with 120,000 square feet of retail to be redeveloped and delivered late in 2016. McKinney & Olive is a new César Pelli tower with 60,000 square feet of luxury retail and restaurant space in the heart of Uptown Dallas. The Union is 100,000 square feet of retail plus office and a residential tower. The Farmers Market represents a $90 million dollar redevelopment of a Dallas landmark. Originally from Arlington, Virginia, Jack received his Bachelor of Science degree from Vanderbilt University. He served in the Armed Forces and resigned from the Army with commendation as a Captain in the Corps of Engineers.

As Director of Real Estate, Shea Byers is responsible for sourcing, underwriting and executing corporate acquisition and development initiatives and commercial brokerage for the J Street Southwest Regional office in Dallas, TX. After beginning his career as a Financial Analyst at Electronic Data Systems in 1997, Mr. Byers transitioned quickly toward his passion, real estate. In 2000, Mr. Byers joined Kamco Property Company, a multifamily owner/operator, working his way to CFO. In 2010, Mr. Byers moved to Washington, DC, becoming Vice President of office leasing with J Street Companies (2010 – 2014). Mr. Byers served in a similar capacity at PMRG Dallas (2014 - 2018), representing over 10 million square feet of Class A office and retail space including projects owned by ARA, Aegon, Lexington, Griffin Capital and TH Real Estate. As a graduate of their Real Estate MBA Program, Mr. Byers remains actively involved with The George Washington University Center for Commercial Real Estate and Urban Analysis. In collaboration with the chair of GW’s real estate department, he introduced DFW’s first-ever regional infrastructure plan centered around walkable mixed-use development.

Larry was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois. At Ripon College (Wisconsin) he was president of the student body, and editor of the campus newspaper. Having majored in history, he had an interest in historic structures that would emerge later in professional life. In his military career, he directed a Czech-German border resident intelligence office during the cold war. In 1970 he joined the Colorado Governor’s Office to build a new downtown campus for the University of Colorado at Denver and two other colleges. The Auraria Campus was the largest capital construction project in state history and today has the State’s largest enrollment. He spared many of the historic buildings then slated for demolition – Tivoli Brewery, St. Cajetan’s Church, the Golda Meir house and a dozen historic structures on 9th Street that today give the Campus its architectural diversity and flavor. He left higher education for the private sector joining Gerri Von Frellick, the State’s largest retail developer. Larry became an equity investor in several of Von Frellick’s projects and formed Hamilton Properties Corporation in 1976. While his late campus development served as one of downtown’s building blocks, Von Frellick’s regional malls ironically had abetted the flight to suburbia. During the 1980’s Hamilton Properties focused on suburban office parks but Larry remained a downtown proponent and was appointed to the downtown master plan committee by Mayor Federico Pena in 1983. The Denver central business district was then plagued by commercial vacancy, dead after-hours life and lack of residential living. That would change and Larry’s belief in a nation-wide trend to urbanism would cause Hamilton Properties to focus on downtowns and preservation of historic buildings. Larry helped convince the Holtze organization to depart suburbia and develop a down-town hotel in Denver’s former First National Bank Building. The Magnolia chain was born and he later helped expand it to reconstructed historic buildings in central Dallas and Houston. In the mid-1990s Larry’s son Ted joined Hamilton Properties as a principal. In Dallas, the father son team has been the primary force behind the revitalization of a once dying downtown. Their dynamic mixed use developments, three occupying full city blocks, have preserved historic buildings and strengthened the City’s architectural legacy. His civic involvements have included leading two foundations and chairing two higher education governing boards, including the Colorado State Board for Community Colleges. He has served on the downtown planning committees for Mayors of both Denver and Dallas and has received various honors and awards for contributions to higher education, business leadership and historic preservation and development.

Sheena Paul is the Chief Operating Officer of World Class Capital Group. Ms. Paul is a member of the founding team of WCCG and spearheads the New York office of the firm. Ms. Paul is involved in all phases of the firm’s development and operations. Her primary responsibilities include directing acquisitions, dispositions, financing, and asset management, developing and executing firm-wide initiatives, and coordinating and maintaining investor relations. Prior to rejoining World Class to found its New York office, Ms. Paul was an attorney in the New York office of global law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP, where she practiced in the restructuring and international banking groups. In 2015, Ms. Paul was named a Woman of Influence by Real Estate Forum Magazine, and was awarded the Rising Star: Profiles in Power award by the Austin Business Journal. She is an active member of the Pension Real Estate Association, NAREIT and the International Council of Shopping Centers. Ms. Paul holds a Juris Doctorate from Duke University School of Law, where she received distinction as a Mordecai Scholar. She also holds a bachelor of business administration in the Business Honors Program and in marketing, as well as a bachelor of arts in the Plan II Honors Program from the University of Texas at Austin.

Nile Tuzun, a highly accomplished hospitality design and development executive, an award winning photographer, creative director, art advocate, and citizen of the world, has developed a solid reputation for uncompromising excellence in the world of international hospitality design. Her work over the past 22 years has influenced and raised the bar for the hotel, spa, restaurant and residential experience worldwide, first as a hospitality designer at WATG, then as Director of Design and Construction at Fairmont Raffles Hotels International and later as Director of Business Development for the Puccini Group, Creative Director of Design and Branding for Alterra Worldwide and Director of Design for Legado Companies while maintaining her lifestyle and interior design company Studio Nilebrand and Maksim Mimarlik, A.Ş as Founder and Chief Creative Storyteller. Nile brings a design-focused background to her work, typified by in- depth collaboration with valuable ownership groups, distinguished guests, global divisional team members, internal cross divisional team members and operational team members providing hospitality design and management and operational consulting services. Nile maintains close working relationships with the world's leading architects and designers as she strives to realize design standards unique to each project. With a very confident philosophy regarding hotel, mixed-use residential, creative office space, spa and restaurant design and operations, Nile has and continues to support the future of design by participating as an expert panelist for seminars, design forums, charity events and guest academic lectures and critiques at Pepperdine Graziadio Business School in Malibu and Academy of Art University in San Francisco. Her strategic implementation of design and her understanding of the global marketplace, drive her to realize her goals with conviction and with the utmost professionalism. Nile believes in the empowerment of the younger generation of females and gives her time in mentoring and lecturing at different educational platforms. Nile is also part of The Young Society Leaders (YSL) which is a program that convenes a select, diverse group of the American-Turkish community’s most outstanding young leaders, in their 30s and 40s. Nile is also the Chairwoman of The American Turkish Women in Business (ATWB), a for-a-nonprofit organization based in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Istanbul dedicated to inspiring, supporting and celebrating women in their journey to self actualization, success and empowerment. Nile recently became a board member at The Travel Industry Executive Women's Network (TIEWN), a global networking association with over 10,000 members. Nile, born and raised in Istanbul, Turkey holds a Masters of Architecture with a work career which has taken her from Istanbul to New York, Los Angeles, Dallas, San Francisco, St.Louis, Rome, Barcelona, Milan, Mayakoba, Mexico City, Nigeria, Mekkah, Astana, Venice, Paris, Arles, Madrid, Cabo San Lucas, San Juan, St. Croix and Seville. Nile is working towards her executive degree in Advanced Management Development Program in Real Estate (AMDP) at Harvard University to be completed in 2022. Nile will also attend Yale School of Management, Women’s Leadership Program to be completed in November 2021. Nile lives in California and she splits her time between San Francisco, Beverly Hills and Istanbul during the year. She is fluent in English, Turkish and conversational Italian.

Courtney Johnston is the Regional Leader for the Interior Design practice of Perkins+Will in Texas. As the Director of Design for Interiors in the Dallas office, Courtney is a key figure in supporting the integrated design approach bringing creative solutions to projects from conception to completion. She is a talented designer with experience in many project types and sizes. Most recently she has been responsible for the growth of Perkins+Will’s Corporate Interiors practice in the Dallas market. Courtney’s innovative approach to mentoring and teaching have also helped develop interior design programs at national universities. Courtney is currently leading the project for Perkins+Will’s Dallas office relocation downtown, in the old Dallas High School, to be completed in the third quarter of next year.