About Gunnar Birkerts
Gunnar Birkerts (Latvian: Gunārs Birkerts, January 17, 1925 – August 15, 2017) was a Latvian American architect who, for the most of his career, was based in the metropolitan area of Detroit, Michigan. Some of his notable designs include the Corning Museum of Glass and the Corning Fire Station in Corning, New York; Marquette Plaza in Minneapolis, Minnesota; the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art in Kansas City, Missouri; and the U.S. Embassy in Caracas, Venezuela. In 2014, the National Library of Latvia in Riga was completed to his design. == Biography == Birkerts was born and raised in Latvia, but escaped ahead of the advancing Soviet army toward the end of the Second World War. He graduated from the Technische Hochschule, Stuttgart, Germany, in 1949. He acknowledged being influenced by Scandinavian tradition and the Finnish architect Alvar Aalto. Birkerts emigrated to the United States that year and initially worked for Perkins and Will, a global design practice based in Chicago. He moved to the Detroit area in the early 1950s, where he worked for Eero Saarinen, and was a chief designer for Minoru Yamasaki before opening his own office in the city's suburbs. Birkerts also maintained an architectural office in Wellesley, Massachusetts. He initially practiced in the partnership Birkerts and Straub.
Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.