As Creative Director and Partner, Mike is the artistic leader of RYA. Mike's design leadership can be recognized throughout every RYA project in the last three decades, and has become seamless with the RYA brand of excellence and creativity. He guides a team of professionals who are among the most inventive in retail today. His total approach to store design incorporates his considerable skills in the disciplines of architecture, color and materials, lighting design, and merchandise presentation. He continually challenges himself and others to bring new thinking to clients competing in an overpopulated retail world.

Mike has been a part of RYA's team since 1977 and for over 25 years has helped guide RYA down a path of success. His experience is far-reaching and global. Mike's concepts are expressions of his commitment to engage the imagination of the public and his experience assures workable, buildable projects that surpass the expectations of RYA's most exacting clients.

In most recent years, Neiman Marcus, David Jones, Holt Renfrew, and the Zale Corporation's Bailey, Banks and Biddle store have received the benefit of his creative energies. From the David Jones store in Adelaide, Australia to Neiman Marcus' stores in Beverly Hills, California and Tampa, Florida, Mike has helped create award-winning stores for successful clients worldwide. Mike earned a bachelor's degree in Architecture at the University of Arkansas.