Bernard Kaukas

Bernard Aloysius Kaukas MBE FRIBA (30 July 1922 – 2 May 2014) was Chief Architect for British Railways (BR) from 1968–1977 and BR's Director of Environment from 1977–1982.

Biography

Kaukas was born in Hackney (London),[1] on 30 July 1922 to Joseph Kaukas (1885–1964) and Ethel Margaret Morgan-Adlam (1894–1979). He was schooled at St Ignatius College, Stamford Hill.[2]

"It is important that uses should be found for redundant listed buildings [in Britain], but the growth of modern legislation relating to safety and welfare has created its own Frankensteins in the gaunt spectres of uninhabitable and unlettable listed buildings, particularly in our urban areas."[3]

Bernard Kaukas, quoted by Anne Keleny in The Independent, 2014[3]

During the Second World War he spent a brief period as a firefighter in the London Blitz before joining the Royal Navy and serving on HMS Douglas.

After the war, he studied architecture at the Northern Polytechnic Institute in London, and worked briefly for two county council departments before going into private practice. In 1959 he moved to the British Transport Commission. In 1968 he succeeded Frederick Francis Charles Curtis as chief architect to the British Railways Board[4] and in 1977 their Director of Environment until he retired in 1982.[3] He was succeeded as Chief Architect to British Railways by Ray Moorcroft.

During his time at British Rail he persuaded the company to invest £3m to save the roof of St Pancras railway station which was in danger of collapse.[5]

He was appointed MBE in 1984.[6]

Works
  • Church of the Holy Apostles, Pimlico 1957.
This list is incomplete; you can help by adding missing items with reliable sources.

References
  1. "Index entry". FreeBMD. ONS. Retrieved 7 April 2018.
  2. "Deaths of Two Celebrated Alumni". Jesuits in Britain. Retrieved 28 January 2017.
  3. Keleny, Anne (15 June 2014). "Bernard Kaukas: British Rail architect whose greatest achievement was helping to save the Victorian roof at St Pancras Station". The Independent. Retrieved 28 January 2017.
  4. "Ealing man takes over the B.R. 'Shop Window'". Middlesex County Times. England. 16 August 1968. Retrieved 10 March 2019 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  5. "Bernard Kaukas". The Times. 15 June 2014. Retrieved 28 January 2017.
  6. "No. 49768". The London Gazette (Supplement). 16 June 1984. p. 14.
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