Maurice Mahoney 1929 - 2018
It is with great sadness that Warren and Mahoney acknowledges the passing of Maurice Mahoney, a founding partner of the practice. Our thoughts are with the Mahoney family.
A quiet achiever and expert draftsman, Maurice was methodical, hardworking, and knew the qualities of the materials he was working with. He had an affinity with the builders and those who undertook the making of his design work.
Highly respected by his peers for his modest manner and calmness under pressure, he has had a huge influence on the young architects that he nurtured and mentored.
Maurice continued to practice architecture up until only a few months ago and was very proud of Warren and Mahoney as it is today.
He leaves a very important and valuable legacy for Christchurch and New Zealand. The commitment he showed to his craft and to creating buildings of the highest quality lives on with all of us today.
- John Coop, Managing Director
In 1958, Maurice joined Sir Miles Warren to form what then became Warren and Mahoney. Miles and Maurice, together with their team, went on to design many of the country’s most iconic buildings, including Christchurch Town Hall, Harewood Crematorium, College House and Wellington’s Michael Fowler Centre. These, along with hundreds of other commissions, became a body of work that is now considered to be a benchmark of New Zealand’s post-war modernist architecture.
Under his leadership, Warren and Mahoney received four New Zealand Institute (NZIA) of Architects Gold Medals between 1959 and 1973. He was awarded a Distinguished Fellowship by the NZIA in 2017.
After retiring in 1992, Maurice continued to work privately, devoting much time to Mary Potter Hospice in Christchurch, and many other community projects. Following the Christchurch earthquakes, he re-designed and re-built his family home, achieving a level of quality with that project that matched the very best of his earlier work.
