Geddes, the only child of Louis J. Geddes (born Goldberg) and Kate Geddes (born Malmed), both of whom were from Ukrainian-Jewish families who had been settled in Woodbine, New Jersey by Maurice de Hirsch, was born Robert Leon Goldberg on December 7, 1923, in Philadelphia.
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Robert Geddes (Architect) Obituary
He was born and raised in Ventnor City, New Jersey, went to elementary school there, attended John Burroughs Middle School in the Hancock Park, Los Angeles district of Los Angeles, and earned his high school diploma from Atlantic City High School in 1941.
Due to worries about cross-country travel following the outbreak of World War II, he transferred from the University of California, Berkeley, where he began his academic career, to Yale University in the fall of 1942.
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From 1942 to 1945, his academic studies were put on hold while he served three years in the US Army Air Forces. In 1947, he moved from Yale to Harvard Graduate School of Design, where he graduated in 1950 with a Master of Architecture.
He co-founded Geddes Brecher Qualls Cunningham: Architects, better known as GBQC Architects, a partnership in 1953 with offices in Philadelphia and Princeton. He briefly worked for Hugh Stubbins, Jr. in Cambridge, Massachusetts, before starting GBQC.
Beginning with coming in second place in the competition to design the Sydney Opera House, GBQC won national and international competitions and honors (1955).
Geddes was married to Evelyn for 73 years when she passed away in 2020. They had two children together. Geddes passed away on February 13, 2023, at the age of 99, in his residence close to Princeton, New Jersey.
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