New York architect and designer Costas Kondylis died last week at the age of 78, according to The Real Deal. No cause of death has been provided.
Though relatively unknown throughout his career, Kondylis designed some 86 buildings and frequently partnered with President Donald Trump—most notably with his designs of the Trump World Tower condominium in Midtown Manhattan, N.Y., and the renovation of the Gulf and Western Building into the Trump International Hotel and Tower at Columbus Circle, on which he collaborated with Philip Johnson.
“He has probably designed as many Manhattan buildings as any other living architect,” ARCHITECT contributor Karrie Jacobs wrote in a 1996 New York magazine article. “But his name is not well known because apartment buildings, or more precisely postwar high-rise apartment buildings, are not exactly looked upon as architecture.”
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Trump World Tower in New York by Costas Kondylis
Born to Greek parents and educated at the University of Geneva and later at Columbia University, Kondylis began his architecture career at Davis Brody & Associates—now Davis Brody Bond—followed by Philip Birnbaum & Associates. In 1989, Kondylis founded New York–based Costas Kondylis and Partners. The firm dissolved in 2009 and the architect went on to open Kondylis Design soon after.
Known—and at times criticized—as a “developer’s architect,” Kondylis was first introduced to Trump after the would-be president saw the architect’s work on the 1984 Manhattan Place building in New York. In a 2016 documentary produced by The Real Deal, Kondylis called his initial meeting with Trump one that would “change the course of [his] life forever.”
Silver Towers residential structure in New York by Costas Kondylis.
Between 2000 and 2007, Kondylis designed 65 buildings, which The Real Deal estimates to average at one structure every six weeks.
“He designs an attractive, buildable, functional building,” Larry A. Silverstein, developer of the World Trade Center site, said in a 2007 New York Times article. “If I’m going to do a residential building in New York, the most natural thing in the world is to pick up the phone and call Costas.”
According to The Real Deal, Kondylis died in his home surrounded by his two daughters. Services will be held in October.
