Yamasaki, Minoru

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Yamasaki, Minoru (1912–86). American architect of Japanese descent. He and his partners George Francis Hellmuth and Joseph Leinweber made their names with the Lambert Airport Terminal Building, St Louis, MO (1953–6), the main concourses of which are covered by intersecting concrete-shell barrel-vaults. His grim public housing, Pruitt-Igoe, St Louis (1950–8), won several architectural awards, but made history by being detested by those living there (it suffered several arson attacks), and was demolished in 1972, an event many have seen as the beginning of Post-Modernism as a reaction against the Modern Movement. Later buildings tended to have screen-like elements in the façades that disguised the structural grids. Profiled concrete blocks were used for this purpose at the American Concrete Institute, Detroit (1958), and metal grilles at the Reynolds Metals Regional Sales Office, Southfields, MI (1959). With Emery Roth & Sons he designed the twin-towered World Trade Center, NYC (1946–74—de-stroyed 11 September 2001). He wrote A Life in Architecture (1979).

Bibliography

Wi Curtis (1996);
Kalman (1994);
Heyer (1978);
van Vynckt (ed.) (1993);
Yamasaki (1979)

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Minoru Yamasaki

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