Veteran golf course architect Brian Silva and his longtime associate, Brian Johnson, announced Tuesday they have restructured their business relationship as partners and formed a new firm, Silva & Johnson, LTD. The new partnership has three restoration jobs already.
Johnson, 48, has worked with Silva, 72, continuously since 2009. Johnson earned experience with Silva even before that, having first been hired out of college at Iowa State by the firm of Cornish, Silva & Mungeam in 2001. Johnson left four years later to work for another firm for several years. Silva said in a media release he was thrilled to now partner with his longtime associate.
“More than 40 years ago, Geoffrey Cornish – who got his start as an agronomist working for Stanley Thompson in the 1930s – extended to me the same sort of partnership opportunity,” Silva said. “I’ve worked alongside Brian Johnson for 25 years now. He’s as good a strategist as there is working today, but I might not have recommended this move 10 or 15 years ago. There wasn’t enough work out there. Today there is. This move means Brian, who brings so much to the table, can really spread his wings – and we can accept commissions that previously did not make sense, not for a lone ranger with grandkids. I’m excited to pass the torch while there’s still time to work together in earnest.”
In December the new partnership began a restoration of San Antonio Country Club, which originally was laid out 112 years ago by Alex Findlay then revamped in the 1930s by A.W. Tillinghast – Silva also worked on the course in 2005. Silva and Johnson also are renovating the 27-hole Old Westbury Golf & Country Club, a Will Mitchell design on Long Island in New York. In the spring of 2026, they will tackle a transformation of Boca Raton Golf & Country Club, a Donald Ross/William Flynn design in Florida.
“Brian has been a such a generous mentor to me through the years,” Johnson said. “He and his partners gave me my first job in the design business, but the last 15 years have been different. It’s been a privilege and education to see how he has planned and executed the renovation work at places like Seth Raynor’s Country Club of Charleston, the Ross courses at Interlachen and Brookside in Canton, Ohio, and original designs like The Renaissance Club and Great Horse in Massachusetts. To be out front a bit more as a lead designer and partner is pretty much a dream come true.”
In 2009, after economic conditions threw a wet blanket on new course development, Johnson helped build the nine-hole Sand Hill Farm in Waller, Texas. He then formed a management company to operate that course, which will grow to 12 holes this year. Johnson’s company will continue to operate that facility.