Jorge Arango (29 November 1917 – 21 October 2007) was a Colombian-born US architect. Arango was born in

Bogotá Bogotá (, also , , ), officially Bogotá, Distrito Capital, abbreviated Bogotá, D.C., and formerly known as Santa Fe de Bogotá (; ) during the Spanish period and between 1991 and 2000, is the capital city of Colombia, and one of the larges ...

, Colombia, and educated in Chile, Colombia and at Harvard. Arango was invited to come to America by the

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...

in New York, and the

U.S. State Department The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs of other nati ...

. He was co-founder of the Arango design store in the

Dadeland Mall Dadeland Mall is a large enclosed shopping mall located in Kendall, Florida, in the Dadeland district. The mall, originally developed by the Joseph Meyerhoff Company of Baltimore, opened October 1, 1962 as a , open-air complex of 60 stores and s ...

in South Miami in 1959 with his then wife, Judith. The store, which still exists, was an early beacon of good design, a pre-Luminaire. At Arango, designers could equip the 1960s Bauhaus-inspired homes in Coconut Grove with iitala glassware and

Alvar Aalto Hugo Alvar Henrik Aalto (; 3 February 1898 – 11 May 1976) was a Finnish architect and designer. His work includes architecture, furniture, textiles and glassware, as well as sculptures and paintings. He never regarded himself as an artist, see ...

chairs. An advocate of a

minimalist architecture In visual arts, Minimal music, music and other media, minimalism is an art movement that began in post–World War II in Western art, most strongly with American visual arts in the 1960s and early 1970s. Prominent artists associated with minimal ...

and maximum human value in design, Arango was a designer, educator, and writer. He taught architecture at the

University of California Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant univ ...

in the 1950s, For years he wrote passionate columns against developments in Miami like Bayside, and condo towers that blocked the streets off from the water. He designed several modest-size homes in Miami that displayed his design credo: an open flow of rooms, natural breezes, large windows, no baseboards, small tiles in the bathroom, large tiles in the rest of the home. He was a professor of Architecture at the

District University of Bogotá A district is a type of administrative division that, in some countries, is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or counties, several municipalities, subdivisions o ...

, a columnist for the

Miami Herald The ''Miami Herald'' is an American daily newspaper owned by the McClatchy Company and headquartered in Doral, Florida, a List of communities in Miami-Dade County, Florida, city in western Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade County and the M ...

, and a correspondent for magazines like

Metropolitan Home ''Metropolitan Home'' is an interior design magazine published by Hearst Magazines. The magazine focuses on "high-end modern design and interiors, blended with intelligent reporting, to connect with a progressive reader mindset." History and prof ...

and

Elle Décor ''Elle'' (stylized ''ELLE'') is a worldwide women's magazine of French origin that offers a mix of fashion and beauty content, together with culture, society and lifestyle. The title means "she" or "her" in French. ''Elle'' is considered the w ...

. Over the years he wrote many books including "The Urbanization of the Earth" (1970), "Villa Sofia" (2003), and "Ecophilia: The Future Is Waiting" (2000). Arango died at home in Miami in

hospice Hospice care is a type of health care that focuses on the palliation of a terminally ill patient's pain and symptoms and attending to their emotional and spiritual needs at the end of life. Hospice care prioritizes comfort and quality of life by ...

care. He was survived by his third wife, Penelope, two sons and two daughters, and the design store.

Sources

{{DEFAULTSORT:Arango, Jorge Colombian architects 1917 births 2007 deaths Harvard University alumni UC Berkeley College of Environmental Design faculty Architects from Miami Colombian expatriates in Chile Colombian emigrants to the United States People from Bogotá Francisco José de Caldas District University faculty