Ernest Born

Ernest Born (1898−1992) was an architect, designer, and artist based in California. He and his wife Esther Baum Born (1902−1987) collaborated on diverse projects in the San Francisco Bay Area from 1936 on. She was also a notable architectural photographer.

Ernest was born in San Francisco, Esther in Palo Alto, and they married in 1926 after meeting at UC Berkeley’s architecture school.

Born studied architecture at the University of California, Berkeley, graduating from the school of Architecture in 1922. After graduation he traveled to Europe on a Guggenheim Fellowship, then returned to UC Berkeley earning a master's degree in 1923, with a thesis on the relation of painting to architecture. He worked for prominent San Francisco architects such as John W. Reid, Jr., John Galen Howard, and George Kelham between 1923 and 1928.

The couple relocated to New York’s Greenwich Village in 1929. Esther took a job with Wallace K. Harrison, the architect overseeing the creation of Rockefeller Center. Ernest spent time as a draftsman at Shreve, Lamb and Harmon, the firm best known for the Empire State Building. In 1931 he opened his own architectural practice, working on a wide variety of projects ranging from designing commercial spaces and exhibitions to architectural advertising. He served on the editorial staff of Architectural Record from 1933–34 and Architectural Forum from 1935-36.

He received his license to practice architecture in New York in 1931, and in California in 1937. He was later a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects (FAIA).

They returned to San Francisco in 1937 and went into business together, working residential, commercial and industrial projects, exhibitions, and photography. The Borns exhibited and promoted the then new Second Bay Tradition (1928−1942), and were part of the Third Bay Tradition (1945−1980s) of Modernist architecture and design.

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