Dear Faculty, Staff, Students, Alumni
and friends,
The School of Architecture has lost a
dear colleague, a leader and a friend. Professor Alan Forrester,
Director of the School of Architecture from 1981-1998. He led the
program with great resolve and passion during a seminal time of
academic changes, challenges and opportunities. Alan relished the
opportunity to be a leader as well as a colleague to many. He never
wavered in his belief and confidence in the greatness of the School
of Architecture.
Following is a more fitting and
comprehensive memorial to Alan Forrester, written by his friend and
colleague, Emeritus Professor James Warfield. With great respect and
affection for Alan’s leadership, professional collegiality and
friendship, Jim provides a worthy narrative of Director Forrester’s
life.
David M. Chasco, AIA
Director and Professor
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dear Friends and Colleagues,
We have lost a valued friend, professional
colleague and champion of the School of Architecture at the
University of Illinois. Alan Forrester passed away on November 23
after a year of poor health.
He was 75. His
family is planning a memorial to be announced at a later date.
Alan was a significant figure in the School of
Architecture from his student days in the 1960s and served as its
executive officer throughout the 1980s and 90s. Educated in Glasgow
Scotland, Alan came to the United States to pursue Masters in
Architecture at Illinois with Dick Williams and a Masters in City
Planning at MIT with Kevin Lynch. He married Janette (Jinty) in
Scotland in 1964 and they returned to the USA together.
Alan worked for Victor Gruen Associates in Los Angeles
planning new towns in the American Southwest and later at Craigavon
undertaking major urban planning projects in Northern Ireland. He
began his teaching career as an assistant to Bill O'Connell in the
60s and he and Jinty were among the first married couples (with son
Kevin) making major contributions to our foreign studies program in
Versailles. That assignment in France would prove to have a major
influence on how Alan would eventually shape our School’s program
under his administration. Upon returning to Champaign-Urbana, Alan
rose in the ranks of the design faculty to become the chairman of
the Design Committee. From there he was recruited to the University
of Manitoba to head the architecture program in Winnipeg.
Alan's tenure as Head of the Department of
Architecture (and later Director of the School) began in 1981, and
he soon established himself as a firm leader. I recall the first
faculty meeting where Alan sat at the head of the large conference
table in 210 Architecture and placed his pocket watch open before
him. There was 100% faculty attendance in respect to a friend by
some and respect for authority by others. Alan was to be a fair,
no-nonsense leader. He soon established himself with the upper
University administration by emphasizing the Versailles program and
our School’s strong professional credentials. He built upon his
predecessor Gar Day Ding’s strength, a solid relationship with the
Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture and the American
Institute of Architects. And he drew upon our strong alumni
connections and his ability to attract funds to impress the UIUC
Foundation. His first major program enrichment resulted from his
close relationship to longtime friend and donor Lawrence J. Plym,
when, in 1982, he established the Plym Professorship, a program
which for nearly 30 years has brought major world figures in
architecture into our academic program. Gunnar Birkerts, Paul
Rudolph and Joe Esherick were but among the first world-class
professionals to share their works and ideas with our faculty and
students.
There were two passions that Alan held that
would greatly affect the foci of our School under his direction. The
first was a great desire to bring together the design professions of
architecture, urban planning and landscape architecture. The second
was a devotion to international programs. Early in the 1980s, the
University of Illinois School of Architecture began to receive
invitations from China to participate in "joint ventures." Alan
considered each and conferred with many faculty but waited patiently
until we identified the perfect match, a premier university in China
combining both architecture and urban planning. That program proved
to be CAUP, the College of Architecture and Urban Planning, at
Tongji University in Shanghai. In 1987, Alan joined with Dean Jack
McKenzie and others from the departments of landscape architecture
and urban planning to visit the program at Tongji. In 1988, an
interdisciplinary team of
UIUC faculty members from the School of Architecture and the
Department of Landscape Architecture and 23 architecture, landscape
and planning students initiated the School’s second major
international program, a program now in its 25th year. With solid
programs in Versailles and Shanghai under his belt, Alan confidently
extended our visibility abroad adding programs in Munich, Moscow,
Melbourne and the prestigious Macintosh School of Architecture in
Glasgow.
In the late 1980s, Alan continued to exhibit
keen and creative fundraising skills when he proposed a new building
to developer Temple Hoyne Buell.
He proposed a new building that would house not only
architecture, but that would also bring landscape architecture and
urban planning together under one roof.
He again enticed old friend Lawrence J. Plym to contribute in
the planning and development of the new facility. Alan vigorously
led a group of architecture faculty to convince the chancellor and
board of trustees to allow the School a voice in the selection of
architect for the new building. The faculty was allowed to recommend
a list of five architects to be considered. Ralph Johnson was
selected from that list.
The result was one of the finest physical facilities for
architectural education in the country.
During Alan's administration, I often had the
honor to represent the School as counselor to the West Central
Region of the ACSA. Among those 20 Midwestern programs of
architecture, the University of Illinois was the undisputed leader.
I was approached by other counselors repeatedly with the same
question. How were we able to hold onto a leader of such high
esteem, a man of such integrity and talents to attract funding, to
establish new and creative programs, and to provide such stability?
Much of our national reputation for the last two decades of the
century rested in our peer’s perception of Alan Forrester's
character and leadership. Externally, our peer institutions looked
with admiration upon our program in East St. Louis and upon our
stellar record of accreditation by the NAAB. Internally, faculty
could point to the establishment of such awards as the Illinois
Medal, and student accomplishments at the Annual Architectural
Awards, “A3,” where we all enjoyed watching Alan check his usual
reserved manner to announce in his delightful Scottish brogue the
"crass" total of hundreds of thousands of dollars awarded to
students in our program.
For nearly two decades, Alan weathered
financial crises, the tenure trials, and the debates about the
merits of the 4+2 vs. 5+1 curricular arguments. Near the end of his
administrative career, he was drafted into the College of Fine and
Applied Arts office to serve as interim Dean. Stepping down from the
directorship in 1998, Alan returned with Jinty to France to direct
the Versailles study abroad program, the circle complete.
In the
decade following his retirement, Alan and Jinty enjoyed a life of
international travel tempered by quiet home life alternately in
their Champaign residence and their "wee cottage” outside Glasgow.
Alan called upon his intense knowledge and understanding of world
geography to search for travel destinations and modes of
transportation. This led
to explorations in the South Pacific on ocean freighters and New
Zealand waters on Jinty’s brother-in-law’s yacht, to trips to Machu
Picchu, Turkey, France and repeated returns to his beloved Scotland.
When in Champaign, Alan remained at arm’s length from TBH,
respecting his successors and allowing free hand to explore new
directions. But he
remained a faithful member of the “library committee,” meeting with
Bob Selby, Hub White, Bob Mooney, Dave Wickersheimer and myself
regularly.
All members of our architecture program,
whether close friends and colleagues or new faculty who know Alan
only by name, share a great loss.
In a School which values tradition, the name of R. Alan
Forrester ranks with that of Nathan Ricker, Rexford Newcomb, Louise
Woodroofe, Alan Laing, Dick Williams and Jack Baker.
Alan enriched our world and left us legacy marked by
excellence and professionalism.
He will be remembered as a man of integrity who set a
standard for all who follow in our School of Architecture.
Jim Warfield, Professor Emeritus
November 24, 2011
Additional Information
Director 1981-1998
