Lucien Lagrange

Lucien Lagrange (born 1940 in France) is an architect and a former partner at Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, who founded his own firm, named Lucien Lagrange Architects in 1985. The studio is a representative of New Urbanism and New Classical Architecture.

Lagrange is a French-born architect who came to Chicago, Illinois after studying at McGill University. 10 East Delaware, Blackstone Hotel, the Waldorf Astoria Chicago, Lincoln Park 2550, Ritz-Carlton Chicago, 208 South LaSalle and RIU Hotel Lagrange designed the renovation of the Chicago Landmark Carbide & Carbon Building into the Hard Rock Hotel and designed the Park Tower.

During his course of study, he was encouraged to find a job with a major architectural firm in 1968. He came to visit Chicago that year and saw the construction of the John Hancock Center well underway. He had been a draftsman, but now decided to shift from getting odd jobs to getting hired by a major firm. At school, Peter Collins, a professor of his, gave him a book with only the initials S.O.M. on the cover. At the same time he made some business contacts with Ludwig Mies van der Rohe who was working on Westmount Square at a time when Lagrange was doing some shop drawings. He eventually called Mies' office and requested a job, but was told that they only had enough work to take on a few students and were committed to some from the Illinois Institute of Technology. They said they could refer him to either C.F. Murphy or Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (S.O.M.). Because of the book his professor had given him he chose S.O.M for summer 1968 employment.

When he was interviewed in 1997 about his first thirty years in architecture he marvelled at two major transformations. First he noted that the advent of the personal computer has changed the zipatone process. Then he noted that the real estate/architecture has also changed because "Projects are financed in a very different way. . . We don't custom design everything. We use components, which are pre-designed, curtain walls, ceiling tiles. All the systems exist and we just integrate them in the architecture, which also means we can do a set of working drawings a lot faster today."

Lagrange designed the Ritz-Carlton Residences on Chicago's Magnificent Mile, a 40-story condominium tower built at 664 North Michigan Avenue. In 1996, Lucien Lagrange & Associates designed the building to rise at Rush Street and Chicago Avenue on the site then occupied by the 16-story Park Hyatt. In 2008 Lagrange designed Manhattan's ultra Luxury 535 West End Avenue which is one of the most prestigious residential addresses in New York City.

In 2010 Lagrange closed his office and filed chapter 11 bankruptcy while going through a divorce. "Mr. Lagrange declines to comment about the firm's finances and says the Chapter 11 filing was merely a pragmatic business decision he made after deciding it was time to retire."

Lagrange is currently designing under the Lucien Lagrange Studio brand. His most recent work is the Hotel Riu Plaza Chicago on Ontario Street, and Rosewood Residences on Turtle Creek, Dallas.