Few architects have shaped the pages of Architectural Digest—or the broader cultural imagination—quite like Frank Gehry. Over five decades, Gehry’s astonishing output of museums, performance halls, experimental houses, and philanthropic projects appeared in our pages with a regularity matched only by their originality. Gehry’s work challenged convention at every turn, pairing expressive form with a democratic ethos that prized places “for the many, not the few.”
To honor his legacy, we’re revisiting six standout AD features—early renos, iconic concert halls, quietly radical community buildings, and late-career masterworks, including a private home that appeared on our December 2025 cover—that trace the arc of his singular vision.
September 1987: Frank O. Gehry
Gehry renovated this 1940s Hollywood Hills house for actress Sally Kellerman and film executive Jonathan Krane. The architect reorganized the internal space while keeping the original structure, which “not only remains visible,” but is “clearly the organizing element of the finished house,” said the architect. The first Architectural Digest feature dedicated to Gehry, written by Paul Goldberger (who went on to author the definitive Gehry biography, Building Art: The Life and Work of Frank Gehry), points to features that were to become the designer’s signatures—among them unfinished wood, clashing geometries, and corrugated metal. Click here to see the full archived story
December 2002: Walt Disney Concert Hall
The Walt Disney Concert Hall in downtown LA is one of Gehry’s most celebrated structures; its swooping metallic panels are often compared to a ship’s sails. It’s astonishing to be reminded that the project was built on the relatively small budget of $274 million, “which, if you measure it against other concert halls, is in the middle range,” said Gehry. The architect and his wife, Berta, were longtime philharmonic fans, regularly attending concerts there. Click here to see the full archived story
March 2009: Maggie’s Centers
At first glance, Frank Gehry’s design for the Ninewells Center in Dundee, Scotland, might not seem to be of the starchitect’s oeuvre. The building is part of Maggie’s Centers, a series of cancer care sites across the UK where patients are invited for information and counseling. Gehry’s scheme features a modest entrance façade, which the writer compares to “simple Highland cottages…with a little door at the center that is domestic and friendly.” Yet its interior’s unusual approach to space, the tower’s folded metal roof, and the wobbly wooden ceilings are very Gehry. Click here to see the full archived story
April 2019: Uncommon Vision
One of Frank Gehry’s first famous projects was his own Santa Monica abode, which he first built in 1978 and retackled with an acclaimed renovation in the 1990s. (Situated on a highly visible corner, it served as excellent advertising for Gehry’s practice.) At age 90, Gehry decided to challenge himself as his own client once more, building this second home from the ground up on another Santa Monica lot. Designed with aging in mind, the house includes an elevator and quarters for live-in help, along with the architect’s signature expanses of glass and angled, gabled roofs. With the help of his son Sam, himself a designer, Gehry also installed geothermal wells for heating. Click here to see the full archived story
February 2020: Together Again
Gehry’s long-standing partnership with Louis Vuitton is not a typical one: The Pritzker Prize–winning architect designed the Fondation Louis Vuitton, the brand’s art museum, in Paris in 2014, and collaborated on a line of handbags with the company 10 years later. Still, the flagship in Seoul was the first retail project Gehry completed since the early days of his career. The airy store’s external forms are crystalline, while the interiors are designed by Peter Marino. The powerful union yielded a flagship full of groovy ’70s references while remaining formally cutting-edge. Click here to see the full archived story
January 2026: A Sculptural Home
This Silicon Valley home—which appears on AD’s December 2025 cover—was commissioned by tech entrepreneur Massy Mehdipour, a longtime superfan of the architect. The design for her home, which features sculptural wings similar to those of the Fondation Louis Vuitton and heavy wood beams not unlike those in Gehry’s Santa Monica home, was “nothing like anything any contractor in Silicon Valley had ever attempted,” writes Paul Goldberger. One of Gehry’s final projects, the house, which took 10 years to complete, exemplifies the “powerful and highly intricate” style that will continue to define the generational architect’s legacy. Click here to see the full archived story
