Art Gensler, FAIA, FIIDA, RIBA, cofounder of Gensler, the world’s largest architecture firm, passed away Monday morning at his home in Mill Valley, Calif., at the age of 85.
The San Francisco Chronicle reported that Gensler had been battling lung disease over the last 18 months.
The firm was originally called M. Arthur Gensler Jr. and Associates, when Gensler, his wife Drucilla, and James Follett, a draftsperson, started the company in 1965. Gensler is widely credited with creating the blueprint for how professional service firms are organized and managed. He led Gensler until 2005, when the company’s Board of Directors introduced its current co-leadership management structure. He stepped down as chairman in 2010 though continued serving as an advisor to the firm for seven more years.
During his leadership tenure, Gensler saw the firm expand into a full-service practice whose interdisciplinary approach he helped craft. The firm that Art Gensler founded currently serves 28 practice areas from 50 offices around the globe. The company’s revenue hit $1.55 billion in 2020, continuing an upward trend that dated to 2010. Gensler is 100% owned by its 5,200 employees through direct shares and its ESOP plan.
In its 2020 annual report, Gensler stated that in 2019 alone its employees had worked on more than 7,000 projects representing over 1.5 billion sf of space. Its portfolio that year was designed to save over 16 million tons of CO2 emissions.
“Art’s lasting legacy is an ethos that only he could have created—a standard that allowed the firm to grow and prosper,” wrote Gensler’s co-CEOs Diane Hoskins, FAIA, NCARB, and Andy Cohen, FAIA, IIDA, in a remembrance they posted this evening. They added that Gensler championed an adaptive, proactive, and client-focused approach “that treated service as a privilege and clients as partners.”
ORIGINALLY FOCUSED ON OFFICE INTERIORS
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., in 1935, Gensler earned a degree from Cornell University’s College of Architecture in 1958. Upon graduation, he worked for architecture firms in New York and Jamaica. He and his wife Drue migrated to California in the early 1960s, where Gensler worked for a few architectural firms, including Wurster, Bernardi, and Emmons. While at Wurster, he played a vanguard role establishing design standards for the Bay Area Rapid Transit system, then under construction.
When he opened his own shop, Gensler initially pioneered interiors for new office buildings. The firm started expanding domestically in the 1970s and 1980s, and then internationally in the ‘80s and ‘90s. (Among his accolades, Gensler was a professional member of the Royal Institute of British Architects.)
In 2015, he published Art’s Principles, which chronicled his 50 years in business and lessons learned. The book covers such topics as leadership, talent acquisitions and growth strategies.
Last January, Gensler made a $10 million gift to Cornell’s College of Architecture, Art, and Planning, whose program he helped create in 2006. As a result of that gift, the New York City location will be renamed the Gensler Family AAP NYC Center.
Gensler was predeceased by his wife, who died in 2017. He is survived by four sons and their families, 10 grandchildren and one great-granddaughter.
Related Stories
| May 18, 2011
Design diversity celebrated at Orange County club
The Orange County, Calif., firm NKDDI designed the 22,000-sf Luna Lounge & Nightclub in Pomona, Calif., to be a high-end multipurpose event space that can transition from restaurant to lounge to nightclub to music venue.
| May 18, 2011
Lab personnel find comfort in former Winchester gun factory
The former Winchester Repeating Arms Factory in New Haven, Conn., is the new home of PepsiCo’s Biology Innovation Research Laboratory.
| May 18, 2011
Addition provides new school for pre-K and special-needs kids outside Chicago
Perkins+Will, Chicago, designed the Early Learning Center, a $9 million, 37,000-sf addition to Barrington Middle School in Barrington, Ill., to create an easily accessible and safe learning environment for pre-kindergarten and special-needs students.
| May 18, 2011
Raphael Viñoly’s serpentine-shaped building snakes up San Francisco hillside
The hillside location for the Ray and Dagmar Dolby Regeneration Medicine building at the University of California, San Francisco, presented a challenge to the Building Team of Raphael Viñoly, SmithGroup, DPR Construction, and Forell/Elsesser Engineers. The 660-foot-long serpentine-shaped building sits on a structural framework 40 to 70 feet off the ground to accommodate the hillside’s steep 60-degree slope.
| May 18, 2011
New center provides home to medical specialties
Construction has begun on the 150,000-sf Medical Arts Pavilion at the University Medical Center in Princeton, N.J.
| May 18, 2011
Improvements add to Detroit convention center’s appeal
Interior and exterior renovations and updates will make the Detroit Cobo Center more appealing to conventioneers. A new 40,000-sf ballroom will take advantage of the center’s riverfront location, with views of the river and downtown.
| May 18, 2011
One of Delaware’s largest high schools seeks LEED for Schools designation
The $82 million, 280,000-sf Dover (Del.) High School will have capacity for 1,800 students and feature a 900-seat theater, a 2,500-seat gymnasium, and a 5,000-seat football stadium.
| May 18, 2011
Carnegie Hall vaults into the 21st century with a $200 million renovation
Historic Carnegie Hall in New York City is in the midst of a major $200 million renovation that will bring the building up to contemporary standards, increase educational and backstage space, and target LEED Silver.