Stirling, Sir James Frazer (architect)

Stirling, Sir James Frazer (architect) (1926-1992), British architect whose remarkably varied and inventive work made him a world leader of the profession for 40 years. James Stirling was born in Glasgow on April 22, 1926, but his family moved to Liverpool in 1927 and Stirling attended a local school followed by Liverpool University. Following three years in the office of Lyons, Israel, Ellis, he founded his own practice (with James Gowan) in 1956. The partnership was dissolved in 1963, and from 1971 Stirling was in partnership with Michael Wilford.

Stirling & Gowan’s flats (1955-1958) at Ham Common, Surrey, are reckoned a monument of the New Brutalist school. The highly expressive engineering block at Leicester University (1959-1963) and the History Library at Cambridge (1964-1967) were the major landmarks in Stirling’s Modernist phase, in which he was particularly inspired by Le Corbusier. The Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart (1977-1984), saw Stirling explore Classical themes in a Postmodern manner; this is equally evident in the Performing Arts Center, Cornell University, New York State (1983-1988); and the new wing at the Tate Gallery, London (1980-1986). Stirling’s capacity to “reinvent himself” is evident in the Braun factory at Melsungen, Germany, completed in 1992. The building is of a calm, rational design, free of Postmodernist devices, and many critics expected Stirling’s work to develop further in this direction. Honoured in many countries, Stirling received the Royal Gold Medal for Architecture in 1980 and was knighted in 1991. He died in London on June 25, 1992.