As principal at Denslow Architects, much of his firms work begins with observing the experience of building users, both occupants and visitors. Previously as co-founder of DSDG Architects, the eighteen year partnership produced award-winning projects for private clients, arts and civic organizations, and helped to burnish more prominent institutional identities in the process. Some measure of Tom’s contributions can be gauged from press recognition at national, state and local levels. 

Influenced by ‘School of Sarasota’ architects Ralph Twitchell and Paul Rudolph, Denslow, educated at University of Florida and A.I.A. member, settled in the Manatee-Sarasota region, south of Tampa, thirty years ago, seeking the innovation and international style illustrated in the design of Sarasota City Hall. Striving to improve upon great ideas, he believes working with a regional style best suited to a community a major consideration.

Born in Detroit in 1958, Denslow, raised in St. Petersburg, a graduate of Boga Ciega High School, considers himself an ‘urbanist’, where people can live and work in a safe, sustainable, and friendly environment. How a building interacts with its occupants and community at large, while considered a recent trend, is in fact, a classical notion of design he draws upon.

And though many people think building a dream home or office expensive, Denslow’s experience has proven otherwise. He makes homes and offices for people to live and work in, profiting from clients satisfaction in well-designed space sensitive to their environment. By using less space, affording high quality products, the key to keeping costs down, Denslow creates buildings consistent with a client’s wishes.

A resident of Sarasota, his house in Southside Village, where he lives and works, , Denslow is a firm believer that neighborhoods like this are necessary connections to community and the urban fabric. The mix of styles that respect the older homes while introducing a wave of modern houses creates a contextual quality that honors both camps. For Denslow, respecting people, community, their history, their dreams and their environment is what making great buildings is all about.
“If you can dream it then we can build it.”