• In Memoriam: Leslie E. Robertson (Feb, 12, 1928 - Feb 11, 2021)

The grace and elegance of the structures designed by Leslie E. Robertson were matched by the depth of Les’s humanity. We mourn the loss of our friend and colleague, who died on February 11, 2021, one day before his 93rd birthday. Les was the brilliant and innovative structural engineer of skyscraper giants of the mid-20^th century, including the original World Trade Center and the U.S. Steel Tower in Pittsburgh, and in this century, of global supertalls such as Shanghai World Financial Center and Lotte World Tower. His designs were a combination of keen insight and intuitive analysis, but he always emphasized his love of collaboration with architects he admired and counted as lifelong friends, most especially Minoru Yamasaki and I. M. Pei. With Pei he created the Bank of China in Hong Kong, a peerless skyscraper. His wife of nearly forty years, structural engineer SawTeen See, was his closest partner in practice and in life.

Carol Willis, Founding Director, and James von Klemperer, President, on behalf of the Board of Directors of The Skyscraper Museum

To watch Les speak about his designs and  values, view his 2017 talk on his autobiography The Structure of Design: An Engineer’s Extraordinary Life in Architecture, here.