Tricia Esser is Chief Executive Officer at KTGY, an award-winning design firm of architects, designers and planners who realize new possibilities through inspired design. Tricia has steered the firm in a strategic course of steady growth, and, with her practice of taking on no debt, has never reported a loss. Her insight, direction and leadership have developed the firm’s strengths, stability and depth of resources, and she has honed the firm’s vision of a world alive with design possibilities that make thriving environments.

With Tricia’s leadership, KTGY has grown into its identity as a destination firm, attracting and retaining some of the industry’s leading designers. With the highest priority of listening to and collaborating with like-minded national developers, builders and local innovators, KTGY’s team members work with our clients in six offices in growing metropolitan markets around the United States.

Tricia has been CEO since 2006, navigating KTGY through changing markets with the flexibility and growth mindset that led to a resilient, relevant business. In 2023, KTGY was ranked as the 12th largest architecture firm in the United States by Building Design and Construction Magazine’s Giants 400 survey. Today, KTGY has expanded into four principal service lines in dozens of sectors.

With award-winning client work ranging from city streets to master-planned destinations, and from high-end interiors to affordable housing; in architecture, interior design, branded environments, and urban design, KTGY’s designers are realizing new visions that change how people experience the built environment. Under Tricia, KTGY established an R+D Studio dedicated to exploring the future of residential and mixed-use architecture. The firm also created a Construction Innovation Group to explore leading-edge concepts in construction technology.

Committed to making KTGY a destination for growth, Tricia created and spearheads the firm’s proprietary executive training program, ELEVATE Leadership. She guides the firm’s dedication to mentoring young professionals through an annual summer internship program, and encourages team members to give back by providing structure for volunteerism and company sponsorship of HomeAid, Oakland Public Schools, ACE Mentor Program, and the National Association of Minority Architects (NOMA), and KTGY’s scholarship endowment at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.