47 Facts About Vlastimil Koubek

Vlastimil Koubek was an American architect who designed more than 100 buildings, most of them in the Washington metropolitan area, and whose total value topped $2 billion.

Vlastimil Koubek created the site plan for the redevelopment of Rosslyn, Virginia, and his Ames Center anchored the area's economic recovery.

Vlastimil Koubek tried but failed to cross the border into the American Zone of Occupation of Allied-occupied Germany.

In October 1948, Vlastimil Koubek emigrated to the United Kingdom, where he worked in a brickyard, as a draftsman for the city of Gloucester and county of Gloucestershire, a draftsman for the Ministry of Works, and announcer for the Czech-language news service of the BBC.

Vlastimil Koubek met his future wife, Eva, in a bookstore in London.

Vlastimil Koubek worked as a draftsman for the architectural firm of Emery Roth and Sons, the city's largest architectural firm and a noted designer of office buildings, for a year.

In 1953, Vlastimil Koubek entered the United States Army, where he worked for the Army Exhibit Unit, which creates displays and presentations about Army history, organization, and culture for the public.

Vlastimil Koubek briefly worked for the DC-based Edward Weihe architectural firm.

Vlastimil Koubek passed his architectural exam and established Vlastimil Koubek Architects in 1957.

Vlastimil Koubek was instrumental in helping to redevelop Rosslyn, Virginia, an unincorporated area of Arlington County directly across the Potomac River from the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, DC In 1960, Rosslyn was a seedy area of bars, pawnshops, small industry, and used car lots.

In 1961, Vlastimil Koubek drafted a site plan for the 80-acre site around the proposed Ames Center.

The construction of the Ames Center and approval of a site plan for the area around it led to the wholesale economic and architectural redevelopment of Rosslyn, Vlastimil Koubek developed the site plan for the area bounded by Wilson Boulevard, North Arlington Ridge Road, 19th Street North, and North Kent Street.

Vlastimil Koubek was the chief architect of the World Building in Silver Spring, Maryland, The World Building helped revitalize the long-blighted Silver Spring downtown business district, and became home to long-time home of top-rated radio stations WWRC and WGAY.

In 1964, Vlastimil Koubek received his first commission from outside the District of Columbia and its immediate suburbs.

Vlastimil Koubek initially proposed in 1961 a building with an all-glass first floor and exposed stone upper floors, but the Commission of Fine Arts rejected his design as too modern.

The zoning board was unhappy with the way Vlastimil Koubek intended to conceal the elevator and air conditioning equipment on the roof.

In January 1964, Vlastimil Koubek designed what was then the DC metropolitan region's tallest office building, the 19-story steel-and-black glass-clad Barlow Building.

Vlastimil Koubek's first major DC residential structure was a nine-story apartment building at 1800 R Street NW, which opened in October 1964.

Vlastimil Koubek was lead architect for and an investor in a syndicate which designed a new United States Department of Labor building at 2nd Street NW and Constitution Avenue NW in 1966.

Meanwhile, Vlastimil Koubek was at work designing Bayfront Plaza, a $50 million "scaled-down Rockefeller Center" complex of hotels, apartment buildings, retail shops, and piers on the waterfront of St Petersburg, Florida.

Vlastimil Koubek sued lawyer Hubert Caulfield and businessman Martin Roess, who led the legal challenges against Bayfront Plaza, for $7 million, claiming legal harassment and abuse of the judicial process.

The parties settled out of court in 1972 for an undisclosed sum, and Vlastimil Koubek said he was pleased with the settlement.

Construction on the Vlastimil Koubek-designed 1,000,000 square feet, $23 million L'Enfant Plaza Hotel and office building began until June 1971.

Eight months later, the Air Line Pilots Association began construction on a Vlastimil Koubek-designed headquarters at 1625 Massachusetts Avenue NW, three blocks northwest from his 1965 office building and across the street from the Philippine Embassy.

Vlastimil Koubek designed an eight-story cubist building with an all-glass facade; cutaway, cantilevered front corner; and ground floor arcade.

In May 1975, Vlastimil Koubek joined a consortium of prominent local architects to design the Washington Harbor complex of buildings on the Georgetown waterfront.

In 1974, Vlastimil Koubek was hired to help renovate the long-shuttered, historic Willard Hotel.

In February 1976, Vlastimil Koubek contributed a third high-rise office building to Farragut Square, this one a brick-and-solarized glass structure with a glass-and-aluminum penthouse at 818 Connecticut Avenue NW.

Vlastimil Koubek helped co-design Metropolitan Square, a 12-story hotel and office building complex that occupies the entire block between F and G Streets NW and 14th and 15th Streets NW.

In late 1977, Vlastimil Koubek completed the Camden Yards Sports Complex master site plan, which laid out projected baseball and football stadiums, museums, restaurants, and retail shopping buildings to revitalize the economically depressed Camden Yards area of downtown Baltimore.

In September 1978, Vlastimil Koubek was commissioned to design an addition to the American Security Bank operations center at 635 Massachusetts Avenue NW.

Vlastimil Koubek was the lead architect for Capitol Place, a 2 acres, $125 million project at the southeast corner of F Street NW and New Jersey Avenue NW.

In 1983, construction was completed on Vlastimil Koubek's black-glass curtain-walled Union Labor Life Insurance Company headquarters at 111 Massachusetts Avenue NW.

In March 1986, Vlastimil Koubek was commissioned to design One Judiciary Square, an 11-story office building on top of the Judiciary Square Metro station.

Vlastimil Koubek designed The Westin Hotel in 1985, a structure which successfully used a greenhouse-like lobby space to "mingle outside with inside".

Vlastimil Koubek designed Shockoe Slip, a seven-building complex at E Cary and Governor Streets in Richmond, Virginia.

Vlastimil Koubek did the working drawings for the massive, block-long new headquarters for the International Finance Corporation at 2121 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in 1997.

In 1969, President Richard Nixon appointed Vlastimil Koubek to serve on an architectural advisory panel to the General Services Administration.

In 1984, Vlastimil Koubek served as a consultant to the United States Department of State, inspecting security arrangements at United States Foreign Service housing in Europe and Asia.

Vlastimil Koubek was a nationally known authority on how to draft construction documents for commercial buildings.

Vlastimil Koubek became a multi-millionaire through his architectural work and investments.

Vlastimil Koubek actively continued his architectural career and office until January 2003.

Vlastimil Koubek died of cancer on February 15,2003, at his home in Arlington, Virginia.

Vlastimil Koubek defended his work from criticisms that it was boxlike, sterile, repetitive, and dull.

Vlastimil Koubek was different from so many architects of that time.

Vlastimil Koubek's buildings had clean architectural lines, and yet they were functional and practical and offered good work space.

Vlastimil Koubek did not like mixing older, smaller buildings with his designs.