The career of one of the most significant and popular architects of the last third of the 20th and the beginning of the 21st century has always been presented as that of a self-made individual. The son of Canadian immigrants of Jewish origin (although his father was born in Brooklyn, New York), he was born in Toronto, Canada, in 1929, and became a U.S. citizen after moving to Los Angeles with his parents in 1947.
What is certain is that Gehry was self-made, independent of the prevailing styles or models of thought associated with any particular school of architecture. In various interviews, he recounts how he came to study architecture, working different jobs to finance his studies:
"Frank Gehry: My grandmother played with me on the floor with blocks when I was eight years old in Canada, and she got cuttings for her wood stove from the shop. They were like bandsaw and jigsaw cuttings, and they were odd shapes, and we used to play, make fantasy cities. Grandmother! So it was like a license from an adult to play, creative play. Anyway, I didn’t remember that until I was struggling and struggling with what I wanted to be when I grew up. I was a truck driver in L.A., going to City College, and I tried radio announcing, which I wasn’t very good at.” (2)
His years working as a truck driver, the construction of his own identity, were constantly reflected in his life, as he mentioned in the interview that opens his biography of Rizzoli (1985):
../... Peter Arnell: How long have you been in practice?
Frank Gehry: Practicing what?
PA: Architecture.
FG: I used to practice the guitar. When I was a kid I took guitar lessons and I practiced a lot then. Architecture? I practice every day.
PA: How long have you been in practice?
FG: At least 12 hours a day—like a fine pianist.
PA: For how long?
FG: 12 hours.
PA: How many years have you been in practice?
FG: With my own office, since 1962; but I started working for
other people in 1952.
PA: What was the first office you worked in?
FG: William Morris. Not the famous William Morris. This was the schlock William Morris in Los Angeles. The office was next door to William Morris in Los Angeles. The office was next door to William Saroyan’s office when he was writing “Come on to my house, my house, come on.”
PA: What I’m going to do now is I’m going to ask some dumb questions and the questions shouldn’t at all…
FG: Be answered. ../...(3)
In 1962, he opened his own office, Frank O. Gehry & Associates, in Santa Monica. In the late 1960s, he began to distance himself from modernist conventions, showing an interest in science and NASA. His work became infused with his relationships with gallery-owner friends and the art world (Mildred Friedman), reflecting his concerns in various cardboard furniture collections, such as Easy Edges (1969-1973) and the Fish and Snake lamps of 1983. In the 1970s, his work began to take a distinctly unique path, encompassing houses and auditoriums, and culminating in his own Santa Monica home, which became a manifesto (1978) of avant-garde architecture.
Frank Gehry's residence in Santa Monica. Photograph by Alex Fradkin.
The 1980s solidified his successful career with the publication of monographs and the Pritzker Prize, after which his work gained international recognition, particularly following the Bilbao commission. The city needed to rebuild itself after the abandonment of its waterfront's industrial status, and the commission was given for what some called a risky Pritzker Prize. Gehry, with remarkable intelligence, managed to reunite science and art, using software initially created for aeronautical design, employing materials unusual in architecture at the time, such as titanium, and imprinting a distinctly personal formal language.
Shortly after, he received the American Institute of Architects' Gold Medal for Architecture in 1999. The spectacular Guggenheim effect led to the start of construction that same year on its twin, the renowned Walt Disney Concert Hall, which opened in October 2003.
His studio was growing rapidly, and his office, along with dozens of models, found a home in Playa Vista, a community west of Los Angeles near the Pacific Ocean, in an industrial space that had once been a BMW research center. This space, flooded with light and reflecting his work, would be his studio for the last twenty-five years of his life. In 2005, he starred in The Simpsons episode The Seven-Beer Snitch, playing himself and demonstrating his critical ability towards his own work, a rare sign of intelligence in the profession.
In 2006, he returned to Spain with the construction of the Marqués de Riscal winery in Elciego (Álava), once again becoming the epicenter of tourist attraction in the region. In 2008, the Venice Biennale awarded Gehry the Golden Lion in recognition of his entire career, and exhibitions in international museums, such as the Pompidou Centre or Gemini, continued to solidify his prestige. In 2014, he received the Prince of Asturias Award.
He never stopped working: he continued designing skyscrapers, splendid concert halls, such as the new Pierre Boulez Saal, and yachts like the Foggy 1. The accolades far outweighed the criticism from some of his detractors, and in 2016, he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from the United States, presented by Barack Obama.
With the death of Frank Gehry, an era comes to a close. He was one of the most brilliant architects of his time; With a bold and transgressive architecture, he revitalized the architecture of his time, disconcerting many in the profession and outside of it, to whom he dedicated, for their pretentious stiffness, a histrionic middle finger that demonstrated his genius and character until the end.
NOTES.-
(1) José Juan Barba. «AnyWay Congress. The city of cities». Madrid: Fundación Arquia, 2019. P.27. Herbert Muschamp. «The Miracle In Bilbao». Magazine. The New York Times, New York, Sep. 7, 1997.
(2) "Biography and video interview with Frank O. Gehry at the Academy of Achievement". ("Frank O. Gehry." American Academy of Achievement. Accessed December 6, 2025, <https://achievement.org/video/frank-gehry-1>).
(3) «Frank Gehry. Buildings and Projects» Edited by Peter Arnell and Ted Bickford. New York: Rizzoli, 1985. Pp. XII-XII.
