Texas law firm poaches real estate group to open Atlanta office
A large Texas law firm is opening an Atlanta office with a group of real estate attorneys it poached from the Buckhead base of newly merged firm Taft | Morris Manning.
Winstead’s move into Atlanta is the latest in a series of recent market changes driven in large part by outside law firms that have caused some local firms to fold and helped others flourish.
The Dallas-headquartered firm, with around 320 lawyers, has six offices in Texas and three others in North Carolina, Tennessee and New York. It primarily serves the real estate industry but has also built significant practices around clients in other sectors, including health care, finance, airlines and education.
Winstead Chairman and CEO Jeff Matthews said he’d long worked with and opposite Morris Manning & Martin real estate partner Christina Graham and told her several years ago he was interested in her joining the firm. He said she called in January, just after Morris Manning’s merger with Taft Stettinius & Hollister took effect.
“We were not even planning on opening an Atlanta office this year, but when Christina called, we said, ‘Let’s full-throttle get this done, because this is an opportunity that won’t come along again,’” Matthews told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Tuesday.
Graham is now the managing shareholder of Winstead’s new Atlanta office, located in the Monarch Plaza high-rise in Buckhead. She moved from Taft | Morris Manning with six other real estate attorneys, including partners Michael Rhim, Matthew Sours and Pelham Wilder, who have become Winstead shareholders.
Counsel Tammi Parker and associates John Cagigas and Catherine Nunez round out the team.
Taft | Morris Manning is losing the real estate group just after adding Alston & Bird counsel Rick Pilch as an Atlanta-based partner in its real estate practice.
“With Taft’s unique platform, we are one of the fastest growing firms in the country, and we will continue to expand in Atlanta and other markets,” Taft | Morris Manning said in a statement to the AJC on Tuesday. “We wish our former colleagues the best with their new firm.”
Morris Manning, established in Atlanta in 1976, merged with Taft, a larger national firm, at the end of last year. It came after several teams of Morris Manning lawyers jumped ship to competitors, roughly halving the firm’s size.
The combined full-service firm has more than 1,000 lawyers and plans to more than double the number of attorneys in its Atlanta office to over 150 within three to five years.
Matthews said he expects Winstead’s new Atlanta office to grow quickly as the firm identifies lawyers who best match its culture and serve its clients nationwide, including those in Georgia. He said it made sense to hire Graham and her teammates no matter where they based themselves because their personalities, values and long-term vision matched.
“The fact that they sat in Atlanta just was an added plus,” he said. “That was a market that we’d always thought we need to get into eventually, but we weren’t going to get into it unless we were able to get the right group of people.”
Winstead, founded in 1973, hasn’t opened an office since September 2024, when it set up shop in Nashville to cater to the thriving demand there for health care-related real estate services. It doesn’t plan to open any more offices this year, Matthews said.
About half the firm’s lawyers are based in Dallas, its largest office. Winstead opened its offices in Charlotte, North Carolina, and New York City in 2010 and 2020, respectively.
Matthews said the Atlanta office is set to develop around real estate, corporate and litigation services. He said Atlanta is one of the top real estate markets in the country and is benefiting from a widespread push of people and businesses into the South.
“It wouldn’t surprise me if Atlanta, in five years, is one of our bigger offices,” he said. “I think this is going to be a full-service office in the near term.”
Graham said Winstead has built an exceptional reputation for advising clients on complex real estate transactions and development projects, and she and her teammates are excited about helping the firm establish a presence in Atlanta.
“Bringing that platform to one of the country’s most active real estate markets is a significant opportunity,” she said. “We are eager to work alongside Winstead’s attorneys and to serve clients throughout the country.”
About the Author
Journalist Rosie Manins is a legal affairs reporter for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
