My only extravagance in life is my sailboat. I'm bonkers about that, but other than that, I don't spend money on myself.

I have been black and blue in some spot, somewhere, almost all my life from too intimate contacts with my own furniture.

When I was in architecture school at Princeton, the worst thing you could say about someone was that they were eclectic.

Genius is personal, decided by fate, but it expresses itself by means of system. There is no work of art without system.

The first complete sentence out of my mouth was probably that line about consistency being the hobgoblin of small minds.

God is the great comprehensive a priori integrity of Universe within which human beings find themselves to be operating.

The stronger the identity, the more it imprisons, the more it resists expansion, interpretation, renewal, contradiction.

Let's put it this way: One can be happy or unhappy in a building. But some buildings make us more depressed than others.

One of our theories is that one can offset this excessive compulsion toward the spectacular with a return to simplicity.

The architect who really designs for a human being has to know a great deal more than just the Five Canons of Vitruvius.

What I do is the opposite of building walls. I build bridges. A bridge is something that connects instead of separating.

We only exist in terms of how we think we exist. Meaning every cultural development is fabricated and can be fabricated.

Indeed, our designs become more ambitious as we see the new possibilities created by the technology of other industries.

I am equally proud of all of my architectural projects. It's always rewarding to see an ambitious design become reality.

I love driving around east London - it's always full of surprises. Actually, I don't drive myself - I like to be driven.

I can't focus when there's too many things around. Whenever I used to go to the office, I used to always say, 'Tidy up.'

Great buildings that move the spirit have always been rare. In every case they are unique, poetic, products of the heart.

Your work may be great and not make its way into the big picture... like Van Gogh... so who's to say what's good and bad?

New York was a place I wanted to live and work all along. If I wasn't going to live in Israel, I had to live in New York.

In America, writers are afforded the freedom to express themselves in unlimited manners. Creative liberty is a privilege.

Now there is one outstanding important fact regarding spaceship earth, and that is that no instruction book came with it.

A pattern has an integrity independent of the medium by virtue of which you have received the information that it exists.

I liked painting and drawing, and I liked humanities mainly - poetry, literature - this speculative attitude toward life.

When I was a student in the '60s, I dreamt of making a house 7 feet by 7 feet, as a dream of freedom, of self-moderation.

Because of the nature of the profession of architecture, the art of architecture nourishes itself from other disciplines.

The mere drawing and painting world of the pattern designer and the applied artist must become a world that builds again.

There are no straight lines or sharp corners in nature. Therefore, buildings must have no straight lines or sharp corners.

Cardboard is another material that's ubiquitous and everybody hates, yet when I made furniture with it everybody loved it.

Picasso could use everyone's paintings and transform them into his own. He was using ideas from all of his contemporaries.

I think Miss Monroe as architecture is extremely good architecture, and she's a very natural actress, and a very good one.

If the words make sense on paper, and make me feel good, and I feel like it will connect, that's all I'm worried about it.

O hasten, Lord, these promised days, When Israel shall rejoice, And Jew and Gentile join in praise, With one united voice!

There are bound to be differences in any artistic collaboration with landscape elements, or theater, of lighting elements.

I tend to move between turtlenecks and shirts and ties. I don't really have a uniform in the sense that some people might.

Architecture is exposed to life. If its body is sensitive enough, it can assume a quality that bears witness to past life.

I am deeply impressed with the designer of the universe; I am confident I couldnt have done anywhere near such a good job.

Nobody should be anything, but because I once had a different profession and I'm interested in writing, I took it upon me.

The details are the very source of expression in architecture. But we are caught in a vice between art and the bottom line.

Architecture and any art can transform a person, even save someone. It can for children - for anyone. It still does for me.

Well, I've always just - I've never really gone out looking for work. I always waited for it to sort of hit me on the head.

I strive to seek new material that fit into the logic of construction, while performing services appropriate to real needs.

'Form follows function' comes with so much baggage. It's a worthless phrase because you'll never take it for what it means.

Architecture is the art of reconciliation between ourselves andthe world, and this mediation takes place through the senses

A lot of my work is about questioning the stability and permanence of architecture, and, in turn, the stability of society.

I think my desire to imagine a future for this site came out of trying to come to terms with the emotions that day aroused.

I had some good opportunities. I was lucky to have had the chance to do things differently. Architecture is about surprise.

If an architect's ego is very small, he is done for it; if it is vast then he might make some very important contributions.

I always look for inspiration, and the creativity of artists is an essential element to my life, my work, and my happiness.

You're going to change the world? Well, go ahead and try. You'll give it up at a certain point and change yourself instead.

You can't change anything by fighting or resisting it. You change something by making it obsolete through superior methods.

Share This Page