Alfred Alexander Coutts attended Dundee College of Art (now the Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art & Design, University of Dundee), Scotland where he gained a Diploma in Architecture and was elected an Associate of the RIBA in 1955. After graduation he was employed by the Cumbernauld Development Corporation, before moving to London in the early 1960s. He was subsequently funded by the UK War Office to attend the 1961-62 postgraduate course run by the Architectural Association Department of Tropical Studies. He attended on a ‘lectures only’ basis, meaning that he was not entitled to receive a Certificate in Tropical Studies. Upon completion of the course, Coutts worked for the Ministry of Public Building and Works and rose through the ranks to become a Superintending Architect, within the Directorate of Estate Management (Overseas) by 1972. His major work for the Property Services Agency (one of the successor bodies to the Ministry) was heading the design team which replaced Alison and Peter Smithson, for the British Embassy in Brasilia, designed from 1974 and constructed 1980-83. The embassy comprised of a free-standing, pyramid-shaped, function room and exhibition space, together with a three-storey office block, a residential building and other additional structures. By 1979 he appears to have been appointed Director of Overseas Services for the UK Property Services Agency.

 Sources

• Architectural Association Student Register, 1961-62. AA Archives
• RIBA Kalendar, 1960, Royal Institute of British Architects, 1960
• RIBA Kalendar, 1965, Royal Institute of British Architects, 1965
• Directory of Official Architects and Planners, 1972, Architecture and Planning Publications Ltd., 1972, p12
• ‘British embassy, Brasilia; Architects: Alf Coutts, of: GB. Department of the Environment. Property Services Agency’, Construction (London), No. 44, 1983, Autumn, p24
• Bertram, M. ‘Room for Diplomacy: Britain’s Diplomatic Buildings Overseas 1800-2000’, Spire Books, 2011