Friedrich St. Florian

Friedrich St. Florian (born 1932) is an Austrian-American architect. He was born Friedrich St. Florian Gartler in the Austrian city of Graz. He moved to the USA in 1961, and became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1973.

His generation produced a famous group of Austrian avant-garde architects: Hans Hollein, Walter Pichler, Raimund Abraham. Abraham was also a classmate of St. Florian and has worked with him on multiple occasions.

"When I was 10 or 11, I was a sandcastle-builder, a dam-builder. I wanted to build for the pleasure, the delight of it really was amazing."

St.Florian studied Architecture at the Graz University of Technology, where he graduated in 1960. He then won a Fulbright Fellowship which allowed him to move to the USA and study at Columbia University where he earned an additional MS.

After teaching at Columbia University for one year, St.Florian joined the Rhode Island School of Design faculty in 1963, where he helped launch the school’s renowned European Honors Program in Rome, which he directed from 1965-67. From 1978-88 he was dean of Architectural Studies and acted as Provost for Academic Affairs from 1981-84.

He has also taught at the Architectural Association School of Architecture, London, England; the M.I.T, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA; McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada; the University of Texas at Austin in Austin, Texas, USA and the University of Utah, USA.

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