Biography

Gary L. Cole AIA, Esq. Professional & Educational Biography

Biography

Gary L. Cole AIA, Esq. is a Chica­go-based Illi­nois and Flori­da licensed attor­ney, an Illi­nois licensed archi­tect, and a con­struc­tion, com­mer­cial, and con­sumer arbi­tra­tor, medi­a­tor, and admin­is­tra­tive law judge.  He also serves as an expert wit­ness for con­struc­tion and his­toric preser­va­tion dis­putes, includ­ing local land­mark­ing objec­tions.  He has been an active con­struc­tion, com­mer­cial and con­sumer arbi­tra­tor and medi­a­tor with the Amer­i­can Arbi­tra­tion Asso­ci­a­tion (AAA) and ad hoc since 2010, serv­ing on over 150 disputes.

He com­bines his legal skills and expe­ri­ence as an attor­ney with his design and con­struc­tion skills gained as an archi­tect to pro­vide clients with the unique ben­e­fits of both pro­fes­sions to quick­ly and eco­nom­i­cal­ly resolve their legal issues.

Though he main­tains his Illi­nois archi­tec­tur­al license and mem­ber­ship with the Amer­i­can Insti­tute of Archi­tects (AIA), he has prac­ticed law exclu­sive­ly and con­tin­u­ous­ly since 1998 with Chica­go law firms such as Win­ston & Strawn, LLP and Sey­far­th Shaw, LLP. He prac­ticed with the West Palm Beach, Flori­da law firm of Gun­ster Yoak­ley & Stew­art, P.A.; as in-house finance, leas­ing and real estate devel­op­ment coun­sel for Flori­da devel­op­er The Sem­bler Com­pa­ny; and, cur­rent­ly with his own firm, The Law Firm of Gary L. Cole AIA, Esq.

After receiv­ing his Mas­ter of Archi­tec­ture degree from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Illi­nois at Urbana-Champaign’s Grad­u­ate School of Archi­tec­ture — His­toric Preser­va­tion Option in 1992, he returned to serve as a Vis­it­ing Asso­ciate Pro­fes­sor of Archi­tec­ture from 1993 – 2001.

He spent his third under­grad­u­ate year study­ing archi­tec­ture at the École d’Ar­chi­tec­ture et d’Ur­ban­isme de Ver­sailles, France. He returned to Europe for law school and stud­ied inter­na­tion­al law at the Loy­ola Cen­ter for Inter­na­tion­al Stud­ies in Rome, Italy.

                       

Pro­fes­sion­al Licensure

Attor­ney:  Illi­nois (1998) / Flori­da (2001)
Archi­tect:  Illi­nois (1993)

Pro­fes­sion­al Education

Bach­e­lor of Archi­tec­ture / Uni­ver­si­ty of Illi­nois at Chica­go (1988)
Mas­ter of Archi­tec­ture / Uni­ver­si­ty of Illi­nois at Urbana-Cham­paign (1992)
Juris Doc­tor / Loy­ola Uni­ver­si­ty Chica­go School of Law (1998)