Mary Brush has 25 years of experience as a preservation leader and envelope specialist. She is the Principal and Owner of Brush Architects, LLC. She has built the firm’s as an innovative practice specializing in the Modernization, Rehabilitation, and Restoration of existing buildings. By design BRUSH acts as both prime and specialized consultant to leading design firms.

Ms. Brush is internationally recognized as a leader in Historic Preservation and was the 2005 Richard Morris Hunt Fellow which created opportunities to work throughout France with leading preservation professionals to learn techniques that are applied for creative problem solving on current projects. Prior to starting her firm, Brush created and led the Building Envelope and Preservation Groups at Klein & Hoffman and Holabird & Root.

Mary is internationally recognized for her knowledge involving the complexities of interiors and exteriors of existing buildings including curtain walls, terra cotta, brick, and limestone masonry walls, roofs of nearly every type, windows, integrating new utilities into historic spaces, and modernizing the building for the next century. She approaches all building issues with preservation principles: what was the original intent, how has it been maintained, and how and why is it behaving as it is now. Her experience focuses on managing the continuous occupancy during construction, maintaining schedules, and monitoring the budget. Mary has a depth of experience with a wide range of historic and modern materials on building exteriors and interiors, as well as having the tools to non destructively diagnose building conditions.The key to existing building projects is to find the balance between the original design intent and the future priorities of the building. Mary was named Crains Chicago Business 2021 Notable Woman in Design and Construction.