Craig Webster, passionate Seattle architect, dies in Utah plane crash

Craig Webster was a passionate Seattle architect, pilot, sailor, environmentalist, rower, golfer and champion of maritime history who tried to share his gifts with others.

"He felt he was privileged to have the things in life that were bestowed upon him and he had a sense of wanting to make a contribution and wanting to give back the things that he could," said his longtime friend and colleague, Bob Sittig.

Mr. Webster died on Monday when he tried to make an emergency landing in his 1978 Cessna near Spanish Fork, Utah, about 50 miles south of Salt Lake. He was 56.

Mr. Webster was attempting an emergency landing in a large open field, but he crashed in an area of grass and trees, Utah County Sheriff's Sgt. Spencer Cannon said.

Sittig said Mr. Webster had flown to Texas for an American Institute of Architects convention. He had trouble with his landing gear, so he stopped in Amarillo to have his airplane checked out and continued on to San Antonio on a commercial flight. He then picked his plane up en route to Seattle.

Mr. Webster made a distress call to the tower at Salt Lake City International Airport about 11:45 a.m. Monday, reporting smoke in the cabin, but he lost radio contact five minutes later. According to Cannon, Mr. Webster had left from Price, Utah, and had been in the air only about 15 minutes before the crash. He was en route to Twin Falls, Idaho.

"He died doing something he loved," said Sittig. "Craig always had aviation in his blood."

Mr. Webster was the second of three children from a well-known and well-to-do local family. His father, Holt Webster, co-founded Airborne Airfreight.

He attended Lakeside School, Colgate College University in Hamilton, N.Y., and obtained his architecture degree from the University of Wisconsin. He worked at several Seattle architecture firms before starting his own, C.L. Webster Architects.

From the beginning of his career, he was interested in environmentally sustainable projects, his family and friends said.

"He deeply believed in the whole new way of thinking," said his mother, Kate Webster of Bainbridge Island. "He believed in doing architecture with sustainability and looking into the future."

Among the projects he was most proud of was Bluebell Springs, a private residence on Orcas Island, and his own sod-roofed cabin nearby, Sittig said.

Mr. Webster was past president of Northwest Seaport, which is committed to the establishment of a Maritime Heritage Center, and the restoration of three grand old wooden boats: the Wawona, a big sailing schooner; the Tugboat Arthur Foss; and a lightship, the Swiftsure.

Last year, Mr. Webster designed and helped construct a shelter for battered women in Tijuana, Mexico, with Sittig's church, and he designed several low-income housing projects, Sittig said. In 2005, he led a group of architects to Mississippi to assess damage from Hurricane Katrina.

"He was generous with his resources and his time," Sittig said.

In the '90s, Mr. Webster bought and restored the Deer Harbor Marina, where he enjoyed working alongside the employees and passing out large Christmas bonuses.

Mr. Webster's passion for aviation was fueled just before he turned 50, when Sittig took him for an airplane ride around Mount Rainier.

"He said, 'Wow. I want to do this,' " said Sittig. "And he did. He went all the way through, logging 800, 900 hours. He far surpassed me as a pilot."

Mr. Webster's mother remembers her only son declared at age 49 that he would learn to fly before he was 50.

Mr. Webster was also a golfer, a member of a rowing club and an avid sailor, who lived in a Lake Union houseboat with his wife, Tasha Essen.

In addition to his wife and mother, he is survived by his sisters Kelly Webster of Bainbridge Island and Anne Fox of Mercer Island.

A memorial service will be held next week at St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral, 1245 10th Ave. E. in Seattle. Time and date have not been determined.

Christine Clarridge: 206-464-8983 or cclarridge@seattletimes.com. Susan Gilmore: 206-464-2054 or sgilmore@seattletimes.com