Founded in 2000 by Dan Kubican and Craig Brown, Brown + Kubican began with church construction and renovation projects before landing larger, high-profile work, including the Kentucky International Convention Center in Louisville, the James B. Beam Institute for Kentucky Spirits, the Gray Design Building and University of Kentucky Medical Center in Lexington, and the state Capitol renovation project in Frankfort.
Dan Kubicon
Kubican said he and Brown were working together at another large engineering firm when Brown peered over their shared cubicle wall and asked if he wanted to “go out and do our own thing.” After consulting with their wives, it was full steam ahead.
“We didn’t want to be beholden to anyone on how we did our engineering,” Kubican said. “There was this dream that we’d make the same amount of money and work a little less, because our hours were long at the time, but it didn’t work out that way because we’re now the biggest firm in the entire state. As you do good work, more people want to collaborate with you, and things just took over from there.”
Matthew Weekley
Craig Brown
A key factor in Brown + Kubican’s growth has been its investment in young engineering talent. Since its early days, the firm has focused on recruiting University of Kentucky graduates and other early-career professionals.
As the company has taken on larger projects, it has empowered those employees to grow more confident and decisive, helping drive expansion into Louisville and Chattanooga, Tennessee.
“As we got big jobs and executed them successfully, some of these folks stuck around and are now partners, like Andy [Barger], who moved to Louisville and started an office there when we landed the convention center project. He’s now vice president and the second largest stockholder in the company,” Kubican said.
Kubican said much of the firm’s success stems from a highly detailed planning process and consistent communication with stakeholders at every stage of a project. That includes learning everything possible about each job and stepping outside traditional roles to support the broader team.
But the firm’s most significant contribution to contractors is its intensive pre-planning. What once involved a handful of standard questions has evolved into documentation that can span hundreds of pages, improving efficiency and cost projections.
“Today that job would have not 15 sheets of drawing, but 500,” Kubican said. “That’s dozens of engineers and architects planning out every detail, every little connection, every little screw. Then the contractor takes that information, and the more thorough and thoughtful it is, the more accurate they can be in their pricing and construction planning. The state agencies and universities want as few unknowns as possible, which is why they’re willing to pay a little bit more for hyper-detailed planning, because they know it saves them money in the long run.”
Brown + Kubican's projects include the Offices at City Center in downtown Lexington.
The combination of youthful innovation and experienced leadership across the firm’s 55 employees is especially evident in its largest and most complex projects, including the recent $241 million renovation of Rupp Arena and Central Bank Center, the more than $3 billion UK HealthCare Patient Care Facility expansion and the ongoing state Capitol renovations.
Each presents unique challenges. The Capitol project, which Kubican calls “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” required extraordinary measures to preserve the building’s historic integrity. His team installed more than a million pounds of scaffolding to protect the structure and even sent an engineer to England to study the construction of the terra cotta tiles used in its dome.
“This project is one we hope will be there for 300 years,” Kubican said. “Because of that we’ve had to take a different approach to building, because things that are 50- to 60-year fixes most places are more like a Band-Aid on historical structures like this and can wind up doing more damage in the long run. It’s a totally different philosophy, but when you embrace it, you learn, and there’s been a lot of learning with this project.”
Looking ahead, Kubican said he is most excited to see the firm’s next generation of engineers continue to grow as demand increases and project timelines compress.
“As a business owner, everywhere I look I see opportunity,” Kubican said. “At the end of the day, it all comes down to people. We currently employ 55, but I could use 55 more — there’s that much of a need. At the same time, it takes time to do things well. The goal is perfection, which is hard to do all the time, but striving for it has helped us land some of the biggest and most complicated buildings the state has ever done.”