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August 30, 2002|Volume 31, Number 1|Two-Week Issue



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King-lui Wu: Noted architect and popular instructor

King-lui Wu, professor emeritus of architecture, died of pneumonia in New Haven on Aug. 15, at the age of 84.

Professor Wu was both a popular instructor at Yale, where he taught for over 40 years, and a noted architect.

The winner of the Architectural Record's award for Distinguished Houses in 1966 and 1975, Professor Wu designed over two dozen houses throughout the United States, as well as many noteworthy projects in New Haven. The latter included studios for the Creative Arts Workshop, doctors' offices, a Baptist church, the Yale student Manuscript Club and Chinese restaurants. Locally, his legacy also includes commercial buildings in Winsted; a recreation facility in Brewster, New York; a factory conversion in Fair Haven; a school for mentally disabled children in Hamden; and an apartment building in Bronxville, New York.

Farther afield, Professor Wu designed private houses, an office and apartment building in Hong Kong; and, in 1947, he also created 37 buildings for Yali Middle School and Changsha Medical Center in Changsha, China. He collaborated, as a daylight consultant with the firm of Tai-Soo Kim on the Museum of Modern Art in Seoul, South Korea, and on an Art Center at the University of Hartford in Connecticut. He did several projects with Philip Johnson in New York, and on a number of occasions collaborated with his close friend Josef Albers on New Haven buildings. His writing was published in Architectural Record, The Architectural Review, Werk and numerous other periodicals and newspapers.

Notable among the variety of courses the scholar taught at Yale were "The Art of Chinese Gardens" and the popular "Daylight and Architecture."

The list of celebrated architects who were once Professor Wu's students include current Yale School of Architecture Dean Robert A.M. Stern, Charles Gwathmey, Robert Kliment, Der Scutt, Stanley Tigerman, Thomas Beeby, Jaquelin Robertson, David M. Childs, James Stewart Polshek, Maya Lin, John M.Y. Lee, Michael Timchula, Norman Foster, Richard Rodgers, Myles Weintraub, Vincent Scully, Charles Brewer, Keith Kroeger, Hugh Newall Jacobsen, Frank Lupo, Daniel Rowan, William Porter, Alec Purves, Herbert Newman, M.J. Long and Giovanni Passanella.

On Professor Wu's retirement from Yale in 1988, his former student and then-New York Times architecture critic Paul Goldberger wrote: "Your continued presence has been the one thing on which students, faculty, alumni and observers of the School could count. But it is more than just your physical presence -- I think you have given generations of students a sense that the practice of architecture was a matter of integrity and commitment and not of frivolity. You have brought students into a heavy and profound world without being heavy-handed yourself, and I think they have come out of it feeling that architecture has a sense of grace."

King-lui Wu was born in Canton, China, where he was educated at Lingnan Middle School. After coming to the United States, he studied at Yale, then earned both his bachelor's (1944) and master's (1945) degrees at Harvard, where he was a student of Walter Gropius.

He joined the Yale faculty in 1945. During sabbaticals from Yale, he was invited by Sir Leslie Martin to teach at the University of Cambridge in England in 1974, and he was a visiting professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1977. Professor Wu served on a number of advisory boards and committees, including the Harvard University Graduate School of Design Alumni Council, the Planning Society at the University of Liverpool and the American Institute of Architects Committee for Architectural Education.

In New Haven, he was a president of the Elizabethan Club at Yale and served on the Josef Albers Foundation. As a goodwill ambassador, Professor Wu received a medal from the government of Finland for promoting friendship between that country and the U.S.

He is survived by his wife Vivian of Hamden, Connecticut; his daughter Yeng and his son and daughter-in-law, Loli and Vivian, all of New York City; and his daughter Mai of New Haven.


T H I SW E E K ' SS T O R I E S

University to welcome Class of 2006

Yale will commemorate anniversary of Sept. 11 attacks with discussion, reflection

PepsiCo president Indra Nooyi elected to Yale Corporation

Astronomy students capture asteroid's close fly-by of Earth

Levin lauds Princeton president for her response to Web violation

Howe appointed William R. Kenan Professor

Ma is named Raymond John Wean Professor

Conference to 'put a human face' on the Vietnam War

In Focus: Biodiversity and Human Health Institute

Study: Positive images of old age conducive to long life

Library's debut of Voyager makes searches easier

Show celebrates industrial art turned creative art

Wooden artworks from collection given to Yale gallery on view

Two environmental leaders to teach at F&ES as visiting faculty

Junior faculty honored

OBITUARIES

School of Architecture hosting '3D City' exhibition

Sri Lankan artist Jayasuriya's paintings on display at ISM

Ethics of studies on children to be explored in fall program

Talk focuses on technology's effect on humans

Journalists to gain insight into legal affairs as Knight Fellows

Yale Club of New Haven supports students' work in community

Proper skin care reduces chance of bedsores, say YSN researchers

Books in Brief

Campus Notes


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