Frank Gehry, the Toronto-born architectural trailblazer whose iconic, rule-breaking buildings changed skylines around the world, has died at his home in Santa Monica, California. He was 96.
Gehry earned global fame for his fluid, unconventional designs, but Toronto was also central to his story. His most recent hometown project was a new expansion of the Art Gallery of Ontario, a follow-up to his acclaimed 2008 redesign. The latest work continued his signature blend of glass, wood and sweeping forms, reinforcing the AGO as one of the city’s most distinctive public buildings.
And just blocks away, another Gehry project is now rising in the Entertainment District: Forma Toronto showcases a pair of twisting towers—his tallest designs ever. The development will also include cultural space for OCAD University.
Over more than five decades, Gehry designed more than 150 projects worldwide, including the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles and the Jay Pritzker Pavilion in Chicago. But his defining masterpiece was the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, whose swirling titanium exterior became an instant icon and helped revitalize the Spanish city.
Gehry was born Frank Owen Goldberg in Toronto in 1929. After moving to Los Angeles in 1947, he studied architecture and began forging the expressive style that made him one of the most recognizable figures in contemporary design.
Gehry is survived by his family, including four children from his two marriages. His legacy lives on in the bold, imaginative buildings that reshaped cities around the world including our own.
