Don Ruggles

Donald H. Ruggles is a practicing architect and CEO of Ruggles Mabe Studio, an award-winning boutique residential architecture and interior design firm based in Colorado. Founded in 1970, the firm is dedicated to the idea that beauty can improve the lives of its clients, representing more than 1,000 projects spanning 16 states and eight countries. In 2017, he published his first book, “Beauty, Neuroscience & Architecture: Timeless Patterns & Their Impact on Our Well-Being,” which investigates how timeless forms and patterns in design affect our health and well-being. The book was made into a full-length documentary in 2020 titled “Built Beautiful, An Architecture & Neuroscience Love Story With Narration by Martha Stewart.” It suggests a new, urgent effort is needed to refocus the direction of design to include the quality of beauty as a fundamental, overarching theme in two of man’s most important fields — the built and artistic environments. Don graduated from the University of Oklahoma with a Bachelor of Architecture. He serves on advisory boards for the Rocky Mountain Chapter of the Institute of Classical Architecture & Art; the University of Colorado Denver, College of Architecture & Planning; the Human Architecture Planning Institute; and the Building Beautiful Institute.