London-based Squire & Partners, which recently went through a radical restructure, is understood to have made around a dozen staff members redundant.According to its last annual accounts posted on Companies House (for the year ending 31 July 2023), the practice had already seen some recent contraction, reducing its headcount from 126 in 2022 to 87 in 2023.Turnover in the same period dropped from 18.2 million to 14.8 million.AdvertisementThe practice,founded in 1976 as Michael Squire Associates, was once the UK's ninth biggest practice. Since 2017 it has been based in a revamped Grade II-listed building in Brixton known as The Department Store. Squire & Partners declined to comment on the latest job losses.Meanwhile, AJ100 practice Hyphen Architects, which was ranked 51st in the 2024 league table of the nations largest employers of architects, confirmed to the AJ that it was going through a consultation programme over proposed job losses.The 120-strong company said it was too early to estimate how many redundancies it would be making.The 15 million turnover practice, which has 10 offices around the globe and is a specialist in designing data centres, has seen significant growth in recent years, first entering the AJ100 in 2020.AdvertisementA practice spokesperson said that clients slowing their decision-making has recently started to affect Hyphens UK business.Last year the AJ reported that several major architects had got rid of staff in order to balance their books as uncertainty slowed down construction and stalled progress on existing projects.The RIBAs Future Trends surveys in 2025 have not, so far, painted a much brighter picture. Data collected from its bellwether practices in January pointed to a weak architectural market, with continued reports of intense fee competition, a lack of new enquiries, and insufficient work in the pipeline.The institutes report had also warned that some firms were considering redundancies.RIBA head of economic research and analysis Adrian Malleson said last month: In the context of an under-performing economy and global uncertainty, the architects market remains challenging. The profession remains pessimistic about future work.For the third consecutive month, the RIBA Future Workload Index is negative, indicating that practices continue to anticipate workloads falling in the near term. Most sectors and regions anticipate falling workloads. Expectations for future staffing levels are also negative, with practices reporting that coming changes in employer National Insurance Contributions (NICs) are dampening recruitment plans.2025-03-13Richard Waitecomment and share