Chris Lessard is President and CEO of Lessard Design, an architecture and land planning firm with more than 80 employees across offices in the Washington, D.C. area and Ahmedabad, India. He came to architecture relatively late, entering the field at 27 and first managing a Philadelphia firm's D.C. office before striking out on his own.
He founded CJ Lessard Architects in 1986 and, three years later, started Lessard Group Inc. with $100,000 borrowed from friends. His father's construction business in Richmond, Virginia gave him an early, practical understanding of project costs and execution that has shaped his approach ever since.
Lessard has built the firm around mentorship, collaboration, and research-driven design, developing products such as "Hybrids," a density-housing model bridging townhomes and affordability, and the patented "Stacked & Packed" housing format. His firm's work has visibly shaped entire skylines, including roughly 80 percent of new construction in Stamford, Connecticut, and much of the redeveloped Weehawken, New Jersey waterfront.
