PCAD - Richard George Rogers

Male, born 1933-07-23

Associated with the firm network

Professional History

Service in the British Army, 1951-1953; Partner, Team 4, Architects, London, UK, 1963-1967; he worked in Team 4 with his Yale classmate Norman Foster and his wife Wendy Cheeseman Foster, and his own wife Su Brumwell Rogers. Partner, Richard Rogers and Su Brumwell Rogers, Architects, London, UK, 1968-1970; Partner, Piano + Rogers, Architects, 1971-c. 1977. Partner, Richard Rogers and Partners, London, UK, c. 1977-2007; Partner, Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners, London, UK, 2007-present; in 2013, Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners maintained offices in London, Barcelona, Spain, Madrid, Spain, and Tokyo, Japan.

Chairman, Tate Gallery, London, UK; Deputy Chairman of the Arts Council of Great Britain; Trustee, Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York.

Rogers has won a broad array of architecture's highest awards; the Royal Institute of British Architects' (RIBA) Royal Gold Medal for Architecture, 1985. The French government made him a Chevalier, L’Ordre National de la Légion d'honneur in 1986. He was knighted "Lord Rogers of Riverside," 1991, and made the 178th Life Peer (since 1965) in 1996, becoming a Life Baron of the United Kingdom. He has served as a Labour Party peer in the House of Lords. Thames Valley University (renamed in 2010 the "University of West London") bestowed an Honorary Professorship to Rogers in 04/1997. Other universities have given him honorary degrees including: Alfonso X El Sabio University, Madrid Spain; Brookes University, Oxford, UK; the University of Kent, Kent, UK; the Czech Technical University, Prague, Czech Republic; and the Open University, Walton Hall, Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire; Honorary Doctor of Science, University of Bath, Bath, UK (1994). In 1994, he was awarded an Honorary Degree (Doctor of Science) by the University of Bath He won the Thomas Jefferson Medal (1999) from the Thomas Jefferson Foundation and the University of Virginia School of Architecture. The Venice Biennale of Architecture bestowed on him a Special Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the 10th Mostra di Architettura di Venezia (2006). RIBA named the Richard Rogers Partnership its recipient of its annual Stirling Prize for its Terminal 4 of Barajas Airport, Madrid, Spain, (2006) and for Maggie's Centre, London, UK, (2009). The London-based Chartered Society of Designers gave him its Minerva Medal (2007). The Hyatt Foundation awarded him the Pritzker Prize for Architecture in 2007. The architect was appointed a Member of the Order of the Companions of Honour in the 2008 Birthday Honours list. T

Education

B.Arch, Architectural Association (AA), London, UK, c. 1953-1959; M.Arch., Yale University, New Haven, CT, 1961-1962.

Rogers won the Architectural Association's Fifth Year Prize for excellence in a school project. He attended Yale University on a Fulbright Scholarship.

Personal

Richard Rogers's paternal great grandfather, a dentist, transplanted the family to Venice, Italy, in the 19th century. Born in Florence, Rogers and his family left Fascist Italy when Mussolini cemented ties with Hitler in 1938. He attended secondary school in England before traveling to Venice as a young man. He served in the British Army between 1951-1953. He attended university in London between 1953-1959, and traveled to New Haven, CT, in 1960 to matriculate at Yale University, where he graduated two years later. He returned to England following graduation, opening Team 4, an architectural practice with Yale classmate Norman Foster, his wife, Wendy Cheeseman Foster, and Rogers's wife Su Brumwell. They practiced together from 1963-1967, when Team 4 dissolved, leaving Rogers and Brumwell working together for two years. Rogers associated with Renzo Piano between 1971-c. 1977 while working on the Centre Georges Pompidou, Beaubourg, 4th arrondissement, Paris, France (1971–1977).

His father, William Nino Rogers (1906-01/30/1993), was a physician, who steered his son toward work in a health-related profession. Dentistry was his preferred occupation for him. William Rogers trained for medicine at Florence University, where he received his medical degree in 1931. Upon returning to England during the Nazificiation of Italy in the late 1930s, he worked at Milford Hospital, near Godalming, Surrey, and Epsom Hospital, Epsom, Surrey. He spent the Second World War working at an Army tuberculosis hospital in India. Richard's mother, Dada (d. 1998), an Italian born in the city of Trieste, encouraged his interest in art and design. In later life, his parents lived in a High-Tech residence (1969) at 22 Parkside, Wimbledon, London, UK, designed by Richard, which was passed on to his son, Ab. His cousin was Ernesto Nathan Rogers (1909-1969), a renowned architect who worked in Italy, was also born in Trieste. Ernesto Rogers was a partner in the Milanese firm, BBPR, which came to world attention in the 1950s for their Pirelli Building, Milan, among other works. Richard would become acquainted with Ernesto during his period of military service, c. 1953.

Richard Rogers married Susan Brumwell in 1960. (She was known as "Su.") He divorced her and married Ruth Elias in 1973. Ruth Rogers was a chef, who owned a well-known restaurant, The River Café, in West London.

Rogers had five children, three--Ben, Zad, Ab--with Su Brumwell, two--Roo (born 1976) and Bo (1984-2011) with Ruth Elias.