General
Friedrich St. Florian, Architect of World War II Memorial, Dies at 91
His design was criticized as banal and beneath its subject. It was also praised for fitting seamlessly into hallowed space on the National Mall.
Friedrich St. Florian, an architect whose design for the World War II Memorial on the National Mall in Washington inspired criticism and controversy as well as praise, died on Dec. 18 at his home in Providence, R.I. He was 91.
His death was confirmed by his daughter Alisia.
From the beginning, the memorial itself, its siting on the Mall in proximity to the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial, and Mr. St. Florian’s design, all provoked opposition.
The memorial, a bronze and granite monument featuring facing semicircles of 56 pillars decorated with bronze wreaths, and punctuated by two triumphal arches, was criticized as banal, beneath its subject and evoking the fascist dictatorships whose defeat it ostensibly commemorated.
Others praised Mr. St. Florian for a design that fit seamlessly into its hallowed space on the Mall.
The pillars represent the states and territories, and the arches, the two principal theaters of the war. The semicircles of pillars face a pool with a fountain, and 24 bronze bas-reliefs on the entrance balustrades illustrate scenes from the war years, at home and abroad.
Despite all the criticism the memorial is still on the Mall, more than 20 years after its opening, and thousands visit every year. Mr. St. Florian, an immigrant from Austria who was dean of architectural studies at the Rhode Island School of Design from 1978 to 1988, was mostly unfazed by the criticism, though he acknowledged that he was stung by comparisons to the Nazi architect Albert Speer.
