Deems Lewis McKinley, a California Corporation, was established in 1959. The founding Principals strongly believed that the practice of architecture could have a more personal meaning and could result in the creation of better designs when the principals of the firm were directly and personally involved in each project from beginning to end. The goals of the firm were then, and still are now, to provide designs of excellence, to have the principals personally involved in the work and to offer a broad range of design services.

Prior to 1981, only 25% of DLM’s clients were educational institutions. Since that time, DLM has aspired to design educational facilities that reflect responsible use of public funds, that retain public trust in our clients, and that serve the long term needs of our clients’ students, educators, staff, administrators and communities. Currently 95% of DLM’s clients are educational institutions. DLM’s knowledge of the Education Code, the Uniform Building Code/CBC, Division of the State Architect, the California Academic Frameworks and current instructional theory, along with DLM’s experience in school architecture, come together in partnership with our clients to design and construct exceptional quality, aesthetic and functional school facilities.

The core DLM team members; Wallace B. Gordon, Erwin Lee, Randy Wiley & Chris Ramm each have decades of educational facilities experience. Each has been involved in the planning and design of many new and modernizaed education ranging from entirely new campuses to historically significant modernized campuses.