Mortenson moved into the Pacific Northwest nearly 45 years ago with lump-sum bid work for Seattle’s VA hospital. Since that time, the firm fully embarked on the GC/CM method and then pioneered the design-build concept for the Pacific Northwest. David Mortenson even launched the Design-Build Institute of America chapter in the Pacific Northwest over two decades ago.

The Four106 building is a 475,000-sq-ft, 21-story office tower in Bellevue, Wash.
Photo by Sozinho Imagery

The work has paid off as Mortenson ranked No. 19 in ENR West’s 2026 Top Contractors list and was named the Northwest Contractor of the Year.

Michael Harder, vice president and general manager of Mortenson’s Seattle office, jokes that he’s old enough to remember lump-sum bid work always creating a wedge between parties involved on a job, saying that the design-build approach has improved the firm’s ability to build projects while helping the customer. “It really allows us to sit down and understand their business and what’s important, working with them to achieve their goals,” he says. “There is a customer, but also a client.”

Elizabeth Wako, president and CEO of Swedish Health Services in Seattle, says she’s worked with Mortenson on the hospital’s Providence Swedish First Hill North Tower project, a $1.3-billion effort to replace an old campus. “What stands out most is their commitment to collaboration, transparency and problem-solving,” she says. “They bring deep technical expertise, but they also take the time to understand what we’re trying to accomplish and work alongside us to get there.”

Mortenson continues to boost its footprint in the Pacific Northwest, with a 27% jump in revenue in Washington and Oregon to about $932 million in 2025, up from roughly $733 million in 2024.

That collaborative concept has extended across multiple sectors, even as the health care market continues to boom after a long dry spell. The design-build model has been a mainstay at the University of Washington, where Mortenson has done work for the athletic department. “Design-build is well-tuned because we are all sitting at the table together,” Harder says.

In Seattle, health care, higher education, aviation and private development have been the key markets. It’s different in the newer Portland office, which focuses on advanced manufacturing, energy and infrastructure.

Mortenson’s first inroad to the Oregon market began in 2012, when Clifford relocated to Portland. Two years later, he opened the firm’s office there, which remained reliant on the Seattle operations. The Oregon team became independent in 2018, but that doesn’t mean the two don’t continually connect, with both offices—Seattle has around 200 employees and Portland 150—sharing staff and expertise, just as Mortenson does across the entire company.

The benefits of progressive design-build were on display during the partnership between Mortenson and the Hillsboro Hops baseball club outside of Portland. While working with the city and team to overcome site challenges on a plan to renovate the team’s stadium, Mortenson developed an alternative strategy that included a new ballpark instead of a renovation. It was all focused on a higher return on the dollar.

Thanks to existing site challenges—namely a 6-ft-dia water main that would have required relocation during a renovation and spaces within the current venue unable to meet Minor League Baseball standards—the renovation became cost prohibitive. It was more efficient to build a new park, which opened for baseball in 2026.

A new training facility for the University of Washington’s basketball program sits in the heart of the campus, next door to the school’s 70,000-seat Husky Stadium.
Photo by Heywood Chan

K.L. Wombacher, president and general manager of Hillsboro Hops Baseball, says timely estimating on the front end of the project allowed the club to make informed decisions on priorities to maximize fan experience and revenue potential. Then, during the project, the club could rely on Mortenson’s deep experience building sports stadiums, giving the club confidence throughout.

“Mortenson has great people with good attitudes,” Wombacher says. “Every project can be a roller coaster, so to work with good people who are all trying to build the best facility possible, it helped keep things on track and build solid relationships that will last well beyond the project completion.”

Also in Portland, the Rothko Art Pavilion at the city’s art museum showcased a trend toward renovations, as Mortenson used 37 different phases to essentially connect two separate and existing disjointed historic buildings into one cohesive space while keeping the museum open. “It had a really successful outcome,” Clifford says. “It functions and operates in a lot more efficient way.”

In Washington, the health care sector gave Mortenson its start and continues to offer upside. On the Swedish First Hill campus transformation, Mortenson stepped in to replace a different contractor and solved problems that allowed the 750,000-sq-ft project to finish under budget and ahead of schedule, all while clearing a city block of the existing hospital.

At Western Washington University’s Kaiser Borsari Hall in Bellingham, Mortenson led a carbon-neutral, net-zero energy project.
Photo by Kevin Scott

Navigating the complexity of constructing in a live health care environment has been impressive, Wako says, as Mortenson continued to reduce risk and improve efficiency. “What really sticks with me is that they didn’t just focus on delivering the project as planned,” she says. “They asked us what we would do if we could add one more thing, and we told them our goal was to fully expand the emergency department. Rather than viewing that as outside the scope, they took a hard look at the budget, found creative solutions and ultimately helped make it happen. That proactive, partnership-oriented approach is what sets Mortenson apart.”

In higher education, it’s more than just UW. At Western Washington University’s Kaiser Borsari Hall in Bellingham, Mortenson led a carbon-neutral, net-zero energy project. “We worked really hard to win that project because we thought it suited us well to experiment on and learn on,” Harder says. Working with Perkins&Will, the project required an incredible amount of creativity as the company learned how to calculate carbon and how materials fit into the scope.

To save on carbon, Mortenson challenged the design team to reduce concrete on the upper floors, replacing it with gypsum, and made other changes that reduced the concrete amount throughout the project. That required some education, with Mortenson taking the university facilities team, initially skeptical of the approach and responsible for maintaining the new hall, on tours of other projects across the Pacific Northwest to demonstrate the proposed solutions and build confidence in their use at WWU.

“It is hard to do things new, hard to do things differently,” Harder says. “There is not a lot of trust, and people don’t want to inherit a lemon. That made that project more challenging and more fun.”

Brad Hinthorne, principal at Perkins&Will in Seattle, says that across multiple projects, years, delivery methods, project scales and markets—healthcare, higher education, corporate and more—that the Mortenson team remains “consistently prepared, professional and proactive. They are always a great team member, and their allegiance is always to the project and the owner.”

Mortenson has played a key role behind the scenes at the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, where for the past five years they transferred the entire low-voltage electrical system to a new infrastructure ahead of schedule and under budget without any safety incidents. “It is one of those projects that nobody sees,” Harder says. “It’s all in the walls.”

Mortenson’s work with the Hillsboro Hops outside Portland led to an alternative plan: a new ballpark rather than a renovation. The strategy provided more cost-effective team spaces and a new fan experience.
Photo by HLK Visions Drone Services

The firm was instrumental in the 2021 completion of Seattle’s Climate Pledge Arena, one of the most complex arena projects in the country. A new venue was built under an existing historic roof and facade.

“I think it is just a gem for the city, it really revitalized that part of town,” Harder says. “Every time I go to an event there, I am really proud of what our team did. It is one of the most technical builds our team ever did.”

Mortenson also recently completed a 475,000-sq-ft office tower in Bellevue.

Delivering on their promises and their projects is a key strength for Mortenson, Hinthorne says, and the company understands complexity on projects. “They strike a great balance of integrating design and construction issues,” he says.

“They don’t just build buildings,” Wako says, “they help create solutions that add value and advance our mission.”