Wells Wintemute Coates

Place: Tokyo

Born: 1895

Death: 1958

Biography:

Wells Wintemute Coates was a British architect, designer and writer. He was born on December 17, 1895 in Tokyo, Japan to Canadian parents Sarah Agnes Wintemute Coates and Harper Havelock Coates. He spent his youth in the Far East and served in World War I as a gunner and later as a pilot with the Royal Air Force. He studied engineering at the University of British Columbia and obtained a PhD in 1924 from East London College. Among his first jobs in England was as a journalist and then with the design firm of Adams and Thompson in 1924. He established his own firm in 1928. Coates is best known for his work in England, most notably the Modernist block of flats known as the Isokon building in Hampstead, London. He died on June 17, 1958 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.