Kevin Roche

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Lore & Background

Roche was born in Dublin during the Irish Civil War. His father, Eamon Roche, had been jailed twice for revolutionary activities, and Kevin was born during his father's second imprisonment. After release, the family moved to Mitchelstown in southwestern Ireland, where Kevin worked as a dairy farmer at the Mitchelstown Dairy Co-operative. A life-changing moment came when his father asked him to design a cheese warehouse; seeing his natural abilities, Eamon enrolled Kevin in Rockwell College in Cashel, County Tipperary. There, reading John Ruskin's The Seven Lamps of Architecture sparked his interest in architecture. After graduating from University College Dublin in 1945, Roche worked with modernist architects Michael Scott in Dublin from 1945 to 1946, Maxwell Fry in London in 1946, and studied with Ludwig Mies van der Rohe at the Illinois Institute of Technology in 1948. Unable to afford a second year, he moved to New York City in 1949 and worked at the UN Planning Office for eight months. In 1950, he joined Eero Saarinen and Associates, becoming Principal Design Associate in 1954. After Saarinen's death in September 1961, Roche and John Dinkeloo formed Kevin Roche John Dinkeloo and Associates in 1966, completing twelve major unfinished Saarinen projects including the Gateway Arch, TWA Flight Center, Dulles International Airport Main Terminal, John Deere Headquarters, and CBS Headquarters. Roche and Dinkeloo's first major commission was the Oakland Museum of California, a series of low-level concrete structures covering a four-block area with a park on its roof. This was followed by the Ford Foundation Building in New York City, considered the first large-scale U.S. building to devote substantial space to horticulture, recognized in 1968 by Architectural Record as 'a new kind of urban space'. They began a 40-year association with the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1967, creating its master plan and designing all new wings, including the reopened American and Islamic wings. Roche received the Pritzker Prize in 1982, the Gold Medal Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1990, and the AIA Gold Medal in 1993.

Reader's Guide

Kevin Roche's significance lies in his role as a third-generation modernist architect who, with John Dinkeloo, produced a body of work spanning over 200 projects across six decades. His designs are noted for their logical and systematic approach, exemplified by the Oakland Museum's innovative terraced roof-garden concept and the Ford Foundation Building's pioneering atrium. Roche's 40-year collaboration with the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where he created the master plan and designed all new wings, demonstrates his lasting impact on institutional architecture. His firm completed several of Eero Saarinen's most iconic projects after Saarinen's death, including the Gateway Arch and TWA Flight Center, ensuring their legacy. Roche's work extended globally, with commissions in Paris, Madrid, Singapore, and Tokyo, and his only Irish project, The Convention Centre Dublin, completed in 2010. His receipt of the Pritzker Prize in 1982, along with other major awards, cements his place as a key figure in late 20th-century architecture.

Did You Know?

• Roche was born during his father's second imprisonment for revolutionary activities during the Irish Civil War.
• His first architectural drawing was of a pig enclosure made of concrete blocks, done while at University College Dublin.
• Roche fell asleep during his job interview with Eero Saarinen at the Stork Club in New York, but was still hired.
• The Ford Foundation Building was recognized in 1968 by Architectural Record as 'a new kind of urban space'.
• Roche completed his only Irish project, The Convention Centre Dublin, in 2010.