AADipl
The family of AA graduate and architect Nicholas Roberts wishes to inform the AA Community that he passed away on September 21st. Nick was the son of Cambridge architect David Wyn Roberts, a professor of architecture at Cambridge University, and Nick’s mother, Margaret MacDonald Baird, was also an architect. Nick graduated from Cambridge University, BA Architecture, 1969, and the Architectural Association’s School of Architecture in London in 1972. Several years after graduating, Nick moved permanently to Los Angeles, where he practiced architecture and met his future wife, architect Cory Buckner.
Nick’s most significant contribution to architectural practice was as an Associate and Project Manager for Leo A. Daly in Los Angeles from 1985-2003, where he was responsible for managing a number of monumental, well-known Southern California projects such as the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels by Rafael Moneo, the Los Angeles Convention Center Expansion by Pei Cobb Freed, and the John Spoor Broome Library at CSU Channel Islands by Norman Foster. Nick’s ability to organize vastly complex projects, negotiate diplomatically, and inspire a team of collaborators brought these projects to spectacular realization. On a smaller scale, Nick collaborated with his wife Cory on the design of their mountaintop home in Malibu and renovations of houses and St. Aidan’s Episcopal Church in Malibu, all designed by architect A. Quincy Jones.
In 2003, Nick found his true calling as professor of architecture at Woodbury University, and served as Interim Chair of the Undergraduate Program the semester before he passed away. He founded Woodbury’s study abroad program in China, taking the time to learn Basic Chinese so he could communicate more effectively, and then started another such program in India, where his students researched how water conservation could inform architectural design. He was inducted into the Woodbury University Faculty Hall of Fame in August 2013.
He is the author of Places of Worship published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Nick is survived by his wife Cory Buckner and his daughter, Bryony Roberts.