Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
We live in a complicated, oppressive world with enormous cities and vast populations, and I try to contribute by making it more light and open and calm.
When I was very little my mother said I used to draw in the air with my fingers. I needed a pencil. Once I could hold one, I have drawn every day since.
I like my clients. All of my clients say, "Peter. You're talented. But, your best virtue is your discretion." They really don't want to be talked about.
I don't think we can ignore the Modern Movement. But I wouldn't have minded at all if it hadn't happened. I think the world would be a much nicer place.
It is essential to release humanity from the false fixations of yesterday which seem now to bind it to a rationale of action leading only to extinction.
How much does your building weigh? A question often used to challenge architects to consider how efficiently materials were used for the space enclosed.
When I severe my connections with the A.I.A. I do so with my own self respect, as a matter of pride and I am sure within your knowledge of my character.
I just can't resist mutton biryani. It's something I've loved eating as a child too. Whenever I'm feeling low, I just pep myself with some good biryani.
The function of arts centers goes far beyond being places for performance. They might not be explicitly religious, but they are civic and social spaces.
Good architecture should be a projection of life itself, and that implies an intimate knowledge of biological, social, technical, and artistic problems.
The delusion of entertainment is devoid of meaning. It may amuse us for a bit, but after the initial hit we are left with the dark feeling of desolation.
The innovative spirit was America's strongest attribute, transforming everything into a brave new world, but there lingered an insecurity about the arts.
We are searching for some kind of harmony between two intangibles: a form which we have not yet designed and a context which we cannot properly describe.
We define organic order as the kind of order that is achieved when there is a perfect balance between the needs of the parts, and the needs of the whole.
It's not new that architecture can profoundly affect a place, sometimes transform it. Architecture and any art can transform a person, even save someone.
I find that government can be a kind of gangsterism and is in Russia. And is likely to be in America if we don't take care of ourselves pretty carefully.
Doth sickness fill my heart with fear, 'Tis sweet to know that Thou art near; Am I with dread of justice tried, 'Tis sweet to know that Christ hath died.
To me it was fascinating, the idea of going to university and studying a subject - architecture - that I had already faced in building some small houses.
I am always surprised by how much little emphasis schools of architecture, and indeed, many architects, place on the process of the mating of a building.
The architect's role is to fight for a better world, where he can produce an architecture that serves everyone and not just a group of privileged people.
Education by choice, with its marvelous motivating psychology of desire for truth, will make life ever cleaner and happier, more rhythmical and artistic.
The legendary tumbleweed is really a nurse crop that protects the growth of prairie grasses under its shade, and then it sacrifices itself and blows away.
Technology should be used to create unforgettable experiences that enhance our natural and built environments, transforming them in newly meaningful ways.
Some people may say my curved panels look like sails. Well, I am a sailor, so I guess I probably do use that metaphor in my work - though not consciously.
New buildings should fit naturally into their surroundings, both architecturally and historically, without denying or prettifying the concerns of our time
A building is hard to judge. It takes many years to find out whether it works. It's not as simple as asking the people in the office whether they like it.
You'd never think of taking a cab if you had to walk a mile down Chicago's Michigan Avenue. But in a bad city you take a cab just to go around the corner.
I feel however, that we architects have a special duty and mission... (to contribute) to the socio-cultural development of architecture and urban planning
In designing hardware to be used every day, it was important to keep both the human aspects and the machine in mind. What looks good also often feels good
Water from a fountain quenches the excessive heat which would destroy this life. Thus water can be called the only everlasting source of continuous being.
In a society that celebrates the inessential, architecture can put up a resistance, counteract the waste of forms and meanings and speak its own language.
In order to change an existing paradigm you do not struggle to try and change the problematic model. You create a new model and make the old one obsolete.
There are no solids. There are no things. There are only interfering and non-interfering patterns operative in pure principle, and principles are eternal.
Physics has found no straight lines. Instead, the physical universe consists of only waves undulating back and forth allowing for corrections and balance.
As an architect, I always have mixed feelings. On the one hand, your fingers are itching. As a human being, you are happy to participate in the indolence.
The world has changed a great deal from when I began 50 years ago. I was very fortunate. There were a lot of opportunities that perhaps don't exist today.
My closest partner and the person I have been working with for 35 years has been my wife. She not only supported me and helped me but also framed my life.
Good education is so important. We do need to look at the way people are taught. It not just about qualifications to get a job. It's about being educated.
I've always been interested in combining architecture with a social agenda, and I really think you can invest and be inventive with hospitals and housing.
In terms of form, all the projects interest me equally, although there are obviously large differences according to the scale and process of each project.
It does not do to use it with forms whose origin is intimately bound up with a specific material simply because no technical difficulties stand in the way.
Space has always been the spiritual dimension of architecture. It is not the physical statement of the structure so much as what it contains that moves us.
Inspiration in Science may have to do with ideas, but not in Art. In art it is in the senses that are instinctively responsive to the medium of expression.
I think the future of architecture does not lie so much in continuing to fill up the landscape, as in bringing back life and order to our cities and towns.
The secret to the city is integration. Every area of the city should combine work, leisure and culture. Separate these functions and parts of the city die.
Some people think architecture is about the genius sketch; I don't. Great architecture is a collaboration among a lot of people over a long period of time.
I feel however, that we architects have a special duty and mission... (to contribute) to the socio-cultural development of architecture and urban planning.
I've always been interested in the idea of the artificial landscape. Reforming the landscape. Architecture being a method of reforming the earth's surface.
In designing hardware to be used every day, it was important to keep both the human aspects and the machine in mind. What looks good also often feels good.
Being the gateway to a large city, St. Louis, I had felt from the very beginning that somehow this building should symbolize this sense of being a gateway.