In Memory of Leon Krier

Sketch: Courtesy of Howard Blackson

Leon Krier, a giant in architecture and urbanism and one of the intellectual founders of the New Urbanism movement, died at 79 on Tuesday, June 17, in Palma de Mallorca, Spain. 

From his beloved wife Irene:

He was a craftsman, the son of a tailor and a pianist, who distilled the beauty of the cities and buildings he saw into their essential attributes and used the same cloth to imagine and reimagine places for people to live together.  He was gentle, but uncompromising in everything he did, preferring to withdraw rather than be drawn into political skirmishes, inhuman bureaucracy, or pollute his designs. 

He created beauty with his hands every day: in his drawings, the beautiful piano music he played, the fruit he carefully prepared every morning for his beloved wife.  He suffered viscerally for those in hardship and was disillusioned with the course of the world.  Without ego or fear of voicing unpopular ideas, he remained unwaveringly true to his ideals of beauty, community and friendship. 

Leon is survived by Irene, his friend and wife of five decades, his stepdaughters, son-in-law and granddaughters, his sister Marthy, her husband and their children and countless friends and colleagues around the world whose lives he profoundly touched.

A tribute published in CNU's Public Square is here.

Obituary from the London Times is here.

Additional tribute from David Brussat at Architecture Here and There.

A 2022 NYT article about Poundbury is here. (Krier was the planner for Poundbury)