Entertainment
Frank Gehry, renowned architect known for Guggenheim Museum Bilbao and Walt Disney Concert Hall, dies at age 96
Frank Gehry, the renowned architect who was known for designing the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao in Spain and the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, has died, a representative confirmed to CBS News. He was 96.
Gehry died Friday in his home in Santa Monica, California, after a brief respiratory illness, Meaghan Lloyd, his chief of staff at Gehry Partners LLP, told CBS News in an email.
He won every major prize that architecture has to offer, including the field’s top honor, the Pritzker Architecture Prize, for what has been described as “refreshingly original and totally American” work.
Gehry’s fascination with modern pop art led to the creation of some of the most wildly imaginative buildings ever constructed and brought him a measure of worldwide acclaim seldom afforded any architect.
In addition to Spain’s Guggenheim Museum and LA’s Walt Disney Concert Hall, his many masterpieces include Berlin’s DZ Bank Building and an expansion of Facebook’s Northern California headquarters at the insistence of the company’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg. He also designed the Jay Pritzker Pavilion in Chicago’s Millennium Park and the BP Pedestrian Bridge, which connects Millennium Park to Maggie Daley Park.
Raymond Boyd / Getty Images
Other honors include the Royal Institute of British Architects gold medal, the Americans for the Arts lifetime achievement award and his native country’s highest honor, the Companion of the Order of Canada.
Years after he stopped designing ordinary looking buildings, word surfaced in 2006 that the pedestrian Santa Monica mall project that had led to his career epiphany might be headed for the wrecking ball. Gehry admirers were aghast, but the man himself was amused.
“They’re going to tear it down now and build the kind of original idea I had,” he said with a laugh.
Corey Sipkin/NY Daily News Archive via Getty Images 
Eventually the mall was remodeled, giving it a more contemporary, airy outdoor look. Still, it’s no Gehry masterpiece.
Gehry, meanwhile, continued to work well into his 80s, turning out heralded buildings that remade skylines around the world.
The headquarters of the InterActiveCorp, known as the IAC Building, took the shape of a shimmering beehive when it was completed in New York City’s Chelsea neighborhood in 2007. The 76-story New York by Gehry building, once one of the world’s tallest residential structures, was a stunning addition to the lower Manhattan skyline when it opened in 2011.
That same year, Gehry joined the faculty of his alma mater, the University of Southern California, as a professor of architecture. He also taught at Yale and Columbia University.
Roy Rochlin / Getty Images / www.RoyRochlin.Com 
Not everyone was a fan of Gehry’s work. Some naysayers dismissed it as not much more than gigantic, lopsided reincarnations of the little scrap-wood cities he said he spent hours building when he was growing up in the mining town of Timmins, Ontario.
Princeton art critic Hal Foster dismissed many of his later efforts as “oppressive,” arguing they were designed primarily to be tourist attractions. Some denounced the Disney Hall as looking like a collection of cardboard boxes that had been left out in the rain.
Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images 
Still other critics included Dwight D. Eisenhower’s family, who objected to Gehry’s bold proposal for a memorial to honor the nation’s 34th president. Although the family said it wanted a simple memorial and not the one Gehry had proposed, with its multiple statues and billowing metal tapestries depicting Eisenhower’s life, the architect declined to change his design significantly.
Evelyn Hockstein/For The Washington Post via Getty Images 
If the words of his critics annoyed Gehry, he rarely let on. Indeed, he even sometimes played along. He appeared as himself in a 2005 episode of “The Simpsons,” in which he agreed to design a concert hall that was later converted into a prison.
He came up with the idea for the design, which looked a lot like the Disney Hall, after crumpling Marge Simpson’s letter to him and throwing it on the ground. After taking a look at it, he declared, “Frank Gehry, you’ve done it again!”
“Some people think I actually do that,” he would later tell The AP.
Photo by Matt McClain/The Washington Post via Getty Images 
Ephraim Owen Goldberg was born in Toronto on Feb. 28, 1929, and moved to Los Angeles with his family in 1947, eventually becoming a U.S. citizen. As an adult, he changed his name at the suggestion of his first wife, who told him antisemitism might be holding back his career.
Although he had enjoyed drawing and building model cities as a child, Gehry said it wasn’t until he was 20 that he pondered the possibility of pursuing a career in architecture, after a college ceramics teacher recognized his talent.
“It was like the first thing in my life that I’d done well in,” he said.
He went on to earn a degree in architecture from the University of Southern California in 1954. After serving in the Army, he studied urban planning at Harvard University.
His survivors include his wife, Berta; daughter, Brina; sons Alejandro and Samuel; and the buildings he created.
Another daughter, Leslie Gehry Brenner, died of cancer in 2008.
- 35,270 passengers were offloaded in 2023: interior ministry.
- Number of those offloaded increased to 39,214 in 2024, it adds.
- 45,356 passengers offloaded in 2025 on technical grounds.
In the wake of tightened screening measures at airports and growing reports of passengers being offloaded, the Ministry of Interior has revealed that more than 73,000 passengers were offloaded during 2025.
“A total of 35,270 passengers were offloaded in 2023, 39,214 in 2024 and 73,358 in 2025,” read the Ministry of Interior’s reply to a question in the Senate, adding that 147,842 passengers were offloaded during the three-year period.
The ministry’s submission comes against the backdrop of thousands of Pakistanis being deported from various countries for begging, while tens of thousands were also offloaded at airports over suspected illegal travel attempts, a National Assembly committee was informed in December 2025.
Last month, Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi directed the relevant authorities to enforce strict screening of passengers’ travel documents at all airports across the country to curb illegal immigration.
Directing the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) to continue strict and impartial action against the mafia involved in illegal immigration, he ordered the agency to ensure the effective implementation of immigration laws and strengthen airport immigration systems.
He also called for rigorous scrutiny of travellers’ documents at all airports to prevent illegal activities.
Meanwhile, explaining the reasons for passengers being offloaded, the interior ministry informed the Senate that only those passengers are offloaded whose behaviour indicates possible illegal intentions.
Out of the total 73,358 passengers offloaded in 2025, 45,356 were offloaded for technical reasons, including flight cancellations, passengers’ refusal to travel, technical faults in aircraft, bad weather, flight delays and offloading by airlines.
Providing data on illegal immigration attempts, the ministry said that 861 suspects carrying fake documents were identified at airports over the past three years.
It said that 303 suspects were deported on fake documents, 417 cases were registered, 557 people were arrested and 206 were convicted.
The ministry further stated that 153 additional cases were registered in connection with fake documents and deportations, 181 suspects were arrested and 93 were convicted.
It also noted that 23 departmental inquiries are under way against FIA employees over fake document cases, of which 17 have been concluded.
Beggars issue
The ministry also shared details of beggars who were offloaded and deported over the past two years.
It said that 507 beggars were offloaded in 2024 and 90 in 2025, while 49 inquiries and 32 first information reports (FIRs) were registered in connection with beggars offloaded in 2024.
Of those offloaded in 2024, 59 beggars and 17 agents were arrested and 19 were convicted.
Meanwhile, in 2025, 43 inquiries were initiated into beggars who were offloaded, 37 FIRs were registered and 36 beggars were arrested, while one was convicted.
The ministry further said that 4,850 beggars were deported in 2024, whereas the number declined to 1,187 in 2025.
It added that 105 inquiries and 48 FIRs were registered against beggars deported in 2024.
During the same year, 91 deported beggars and two agents were arrested, while 12 were convicted.
In 2025, the ministry said, 354 inquiries were initiated and 201 FIRs were registered, leading to the arrest of 589 beggars and one agent, of whom 27 were convicted.
Kate Middleton sped up her efforts to bring back Prince Harry to the royal fold, especially during hard times for the royal family.
The Princess of Wales is reportedly urging her brother-in-law to share his plans related to Princess Diana’s death anniversary, so it won’t spoil the Waleses plans.
As Harry is in the news related to a possible reunion with his family, Catherine does not want his actions to shatter reconciliation dreams, Heat World reported.
The source shared, “Royal aides have been working behind the scenes to ensure that Diana’s anniversary is marked in a way that William is comfortable with.”
However, the Sussexes are “said to be organising their own thing, despite requests to coordinate activities.”
Princess Kate seemingly is not in favour of any “clash” between the two brothers, who are already on the verge of lifelong estrangement.
An insider claimed that the future Queen warned Harry that if he wouldn’t share his plans for the sombre event, it “could be the final nail in the coffin for Kate.”
“She’s always tried to see both sides in the hope that Harry would come back to his family. But this situation risks crossing a line,” added the source.
The mother-of-three is no longer in favour of defying her husband William, as the upcoming occasion also holds a special place in his heart.
“She will always stand by her husband. If siding with William means going against Harry, so be it,” the report shared.
Notably, Kate Middleton’s ultimatum to Harry came at a time when the royal family once again made it to the negative limelight following Andrew and Fergie’s vulgar exchange with Epstein.
Fears sweep royal families across Europe as shocking revelations have come to light in the latest tranche of Epstein files released by the Department of Justice in US.
King Charles had ousted his shamed brother Andrew from the royal fold, stripping off the shamed royal of his honours and titles including Prince-style, over his ties to convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. After the King’s landmark move, a beloved royal’s name emerged in the documents.
The Swedish Royal Court had to release a statement which confirmed that Princess Sofia, wife of Prince Carl Philip, had met Epstein but asserted that Sofia did not have any contact with the financier since 2005.
Although, a new email from 2010 reveals that Epstein was receiving updates on the Sofia, as she was getting ready to marry the Prince. Epstein had been interested in inviting Sofia to his private island in the Caribbean.
Sofia’s connection came from her mentor, financier Barbro Ehnbom, who had ties to Epstein. He had introduced her to Epstein as an “aspiring” actress.
In the email sent by Barbro, as it was signed off as ‘BE’, he sent a photo of “our Sofia” who had been enjoying her time in Africa.
Epstein replied by asking whether she wanted to come to the Caribbean and offering to send a ticket.
The exchange was from the time when Sofia had started dating the second son of King Carl XVI Gustaf. She went on to marry Prince Carl Philip in 2015, and welcomed four children together.
There has been no new statement from the Royal Courts so far.
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