Charles Pfister

1939-1990

An architecture graduate from the University of California at Berkeley, Charles Pfister went on to obtain his masters at the Rudolph Schaeffer School of Design. He began his career at San Francisco-based interior design firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill in 1965, eventually becoming associate partner and director. He resigned in 1981 to form his own business, Pfister Partnership, with offices on both the West coast and in London. Calling his designs “opulence without waste,” he created interiors for corporate and commercial spaces that often fused antique pieces with modern sensibilities.