With great sadness we report that Alexander C. Bonutti, AIA, executive vice president of Anshen + Allen Architects, passed away at his home in Oakland February 5 after a brief illness. He was 53.

Rarely does a person affect so many people in so many ways as did Alex. He was a community builder—not only did he literally build physical communities; more importantly, he built communities of people through his sensitive treatment of them and his deep need to help his fellow citizens: family, colleagues, and neighbors.

Alex received his master of architecture and urban design degree from Columbia University in 1978 and Bachelor of Arts in Architecture from the Illinois Institute of Technology in 1974. Before his work at Anshen + Allen, he held leadership positions at HOK and KMD in addition to running his own practice. Alex’s notable innovations influenced mental health and long-term care facility design and urban design in particular, and health-care architecture in general. He developed a model for mental health facility design based on his sensitivity to residents’ daily cycles of live/work activities. He also pioneered a model for long-term-care-unit design that organized groups of family/neighborhood/community clusters.

In addition to his busy practice, Alex served as 1990 president of AIA San Francisco. During his tenure, he helped guide the initiative to remove the Embarcadero Freeway following the Loma Prieta earthquake. He was also chair of the Urban Design Committee and involved in revising zoning in the South of Market and the Embarcadero Corridor Study (which received a national AIA Urban Design Award). During his tenure at the AIA, he helped create the Architectural Foundation of San Francisco, whose mission is to introduce primary and secondary school students to architecture.

Alex led his colleagues to the highest standards of practice. More than anything else, he valued people and endeavored to mentor, educate, and challenge everyone he worked with. In turn, everyone he touched feels honored to continue—in his memory—the myriad lessons he taught.

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