C. W. Kim
American architect
Chong Wan Kim (Korean: 김종완; born August 6, 1938), better known as C. W. Kim, is a Korean-born American architect and urban planner based in San Diego. He trained in Washington state before moving to San Diego where he worked for the Hope Consulting Group, later opening his own firm. Kim's designs include San Diego's First National Bank Building, the Hotel Intercontinental, the master plan for the San Diego Convention Center district, and the Emerald Plaza. Kim was also an assistant professor at the city's NewSchool of Architecture and served on the board of United Way and the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego.
Early life and education
Kim was born on August 6, 1938, in Namwon in Zenrahoku Province in Japanese-occupied Korea. He was born during a period when Japan had annexed Korea and conscripted its resources for World War II. Kim was separated from his father and siblings during the Korean War. Kim won prizes in district school painting competitions, and with encouragement from his teachers and oldest brother, Kim set his sights on a career in architecture when he was 14.
Kim followed his oldest brother to the United States to attend the University of Washington. He obtained a bachelor's degree in architecture from the university in 1965. He later won a Mellon Fellowship to study at the University of California, Berkeley, where he obtained a double master's degree in architecture and city planning.
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This entry incorporates text from “C. W. Kim” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.