Donald J. Mahoney, AIA

Partner Architect

Don was a long-time colleague and Christian brother with Dan Cook for many years. In fact, Don remembers well the year Dan first developed Building God's Way. "Dan decided to commit himself exclusively to working on Christian architecture clients – and called me up one day to give me all of his work with local credit unions." Don says, "I was stunned!"

As Building God's Way came through a time of explosive growth in the early 2000s, Don accepted a partnership with Dan Cook and Mark Hilles. He merged his firm, EMA Architects of Salt Lake City, Utah, and continues to operate with many of the same staff from the same location in Salt Lake. His stunning design skills and effective balance of function, form and budget can be seen throughout the BGW project portfolio. Don's project, The Lutheran Church of St. Andrew, won multiple national architecture awards in 2008. 

Don began his education with a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of Utah and continuing on to earn a Master of Architecture degree from the same university. He worked for several prominent architecture firms prior to establishing EMA Architects, which was selected firm of the year in 2003 by McGraw Hill & Associates. As principal of the 27-man firm, Mahoney was primarily responsible for a wide range of religious, educational, institutional, commercial, performing arts, sports and recreation and retail facilities.

Don served as the President for the State of Utah Chapter, American Institute of Architects from 2000-2001. Most recently Mahoney has been responsible for the launching of "Architecture Utah" celebrating design within the regional area. He is also currently serving on the editorial board for the McGraw-Hill organization for construction and architectural reviews. Throughout his career Mahoney has emphasized the need to maintain solid design approach in all budget environments by taking advantage of the free tools of architecture such as scale, proportion, texture, color and form. This has led to development of buildings completed well under the national scale for cost yet achieving design excellence. These designs require a collaborative approach that includes the client in the design process – a core foundation of Building God's Way.