Michael Bongiorno is a managing director and design principal at DesignGroup, an AIA Ohio Gold medal architecture and design firm with offices in Columbus and Pittsburgh. Bongiorno is a noted design leader with a focus on community impacting, mission-driven architecture that supports and enhances the fabric of the city and furthers a fundamental belief that great design is the essential building block to vibrant, healthy communities. His work has garnered numerous awards nationally, recently named The Wall Street Journal's "Best Architecture of 2015" for the design of Columbus Museum of Art's Margret M. Walter Wing.

 His current projects include the Columbus State Community College School of Culinary Arts and Hospitality Management, The Ohio History Connection Collections Expansion, and the Tucson Botanical Garden Butterfly Conservatory and Event Center. Recently completed projects include the Columbus Museum of Art Expansion, City of Columbus’ Michael B. Coleman Government Center, Franklin Park Conservatory Master Plan and Children's Garden, the Columbus Spanish Immersion Academy, and the Columbus Metropolitan Library  Northern Lights and Hilliard branches. 

Bongiorno serves as chair-elect on the board of trustees of the Greater Columbus Arts Council and founded Columbus’ "Design Weeks,” while serving on the board of trustees for the Columbus Center for Architecture and Design, where he led the award-winning "CBUS ldeabook" and "cbus:FOTO" projects. Bongiorno has presented and written extensively on mission-driven design and creative placemaking. Bongiorno’s 2012 TEDx Columbus talk, entitled "Looking Over the Overlooked," took the audience on a journey to discover new ways to re­imagine cities. Born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, he is a cum laude graduate of the prestigious Pratt Institute School of Architecture in New York City and has lived and traveled extensively abroad.