Richard Bender Collection

Collection

Identifier: 2017--01

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

The Richard Bender Collection spans the years 1950-2013, and includes files created by Bender and associated research organizations. The collection documents his career including his education, research interests, architectural practice, and consulting endeavors. He is known for his work in directing master plans throughout the University of California system, many of which are well documented in this collection.

Series I: Personal Papers (1950-2007), consists of biographical information; student work, including his Harvard GSD thesis on Brooklyn Heights Apartment Buildings and the Monsanto House of Tomorrow; travel sketches; correspondence from Bender’s time serving in the U.S. military; and family photographs of anniversaries, children’s graduations, and travels.

Series II: Professional Papers (1951-2010), includes correspondence, writings, and presentations of industrial and urban research and design done during throughout his professional career. Also included in this series are files from Bender’s time working with other professional firms, including Pereira & Luckman, P.L. Wiener, and Peter Steiger; as well as files from an offer of appointment at Tokyo University as the Visiting Chair of Urban Design.

Series III: Faculty Papers (1960-1999), contain files primarily relating to Bender’s positions at the UC Berkeley College of Environmental Design. This series primarily includes administrative paperwork; course materials; student work; and presentations and writings related to the College of Environmental Design and Bender’s position as Dean.

Series IV: The Urban Construction Laboratory (UCL) (1971-2015), includes written materials such as UCL Newsletters (1990-2004), published papers, and presentation papers. UCL projects include papers and reports on research projects conducted by UCL for GC-5 companies in Japan.

Series V: Project Records (1950-2007), comprise residential designs including Bender’s own homes in New York and friend’s homes on Long Island, NY and the Bahamas, and singer Pete Seeger’s home in NY; designs and Annual Reports for CERN Laboratories the European Organization for Nuclear Research in Switzerland; and consultant work in Japan in 2007. There are also several CDs corresponding to projects in this series.

Series VI: Campus Planning (1950-2001), includes master plans and reports of the major UC campuses with UC Berkeley figuring prominently. Other campuses include Davis, Merced, San Diego, Santa Cruz, and a siting study for a campus in Valencia. Also included in the general files is an article about the Marin Headlands, for which the CED Planning group contributed to the master plan.

Dates

Creation: 1950-2013

Access Statement

Collection is open for research. Many of the Environmental Design Archives collections are stored offsite and advance notice is required for use.

Publication Rights

All requests for permission to publish, reproduce, or quote from materials in the collection should be discussed with the Curator.

Biographical Note

Richard Bender (1930- ) was born in Brooklyn, NY. He graduated from the City University of New York with a degree in Civil Engineering in 1951. Bender pursued graduate work in Building Construction Engineering at MIT and in Architecture at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University, where he completed his degree in 1956. His studies at Harvard were interrupted by service in the U.S. Army and by work with the North Atlantic Construction Company at the Greenland Air Bases. Following graduation, he married artist and writer Sue Rosenfeld. They lived in Europe for two years before returning to New York, and eventually relocated to California in 1969.

Bender is an architect and urban planner with extensive experience in urban, campus, and community design. He served as chair of UC Berkeley’s Department of Architecture, as Associate Dean for research and Dean of the College of Environmental Design, and as Director of the Campus Planning Study Group and the Urban Construction Laboratory at UC Berkeley. He also taught at The Cooper Union, Columbia University, the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the Swiss Federal Technical University, and the Instituto Universitario Arquitettura in Venice. Bender was a founding director of the nonprofit BRIDGE Housing Corporation. He served as an advisor during the design and construction of The Getty Center in Los Angeles and directed master plans for the Benesse Art Site on the Island of Naoshima, Japan and Nanyang Technical University in Singapore. Commemorating his important service to the University of California system, Bender was awarded the Berkeley Citation in 1990. In 2012, Bender was honored with the creation of a fellowship named after him at the College of Environmental Design.

Sources:

Richard Bender Collection, autobiography.

Extent

11 Linear Feet: (5 cartons, 3 flat document boxes, 1 flat file drawer)

Language of Materials

English

Additional Description

System of Arrangement

The collection is organized into six series: Personal Papers, Professional Papers, Faculty Papers, Urban Construction Laboratory, Project Records, and Campus Planning. Within each series, order has been imposed by the archivist where original order was not evident.