There are 360 degrees, so why stick to one?
I don’t think that architecture is only about shelter, is only about a very simple enclosure. It should be able to excite you, to calm you, to make you think.
A brilliant design will always benefit from the input of others.
Architecture is like writing. You have to edit it over and over so it looks effortless
You have to really believe not only in yourself; you have to believe that the world is actually worth your sacrifices.
Architecture is really about well-being. I think that people want to feel good in a space … On the one hand it’s about shelter, but it’s also about pleasure.
Women are always told, ‘You’re not going to make it, its too difficult, you can’t do that, don’t enter this competition, you’ll never win it,’ – they need confidence in themselves and people around them to help them to get on.
I’m trying to discover – invent, I suppose – an architecture, and forms of urban planning, that do something of the same thing in a contemporary way. I started out trying to create buildings that would sparkle like isolated jewels; now I want them to connect, to form a new kind of landscape, to flow together with contemporary cities and the lives of their peoples.
Architecture is how the person places herself in the space. Fashion is about how you place the object on the person.
You really have to have a goal. The goal posts might shift, but you should have a goal. Know what it is you want to find out.
I have always appreciated those who dare to experiment with materials and proportions.
The beauty of the landscape – where sand, water, reeds, birds, buildings, and people all somehow flowed together – has never left me.
Know what it is that you are trying to find out.
Indeed, our designs become more ambitious as we see the new possibilities created by the technology of other industries.
I really believe in the idea of the future.
I used to not like being called a ‘woman architect.’ I’m an architect, not just a woman architect. The guys used to tap me on the head and say ‘you’re OK for a girl.’ But I see an incredible amount of need from other women for reassurance that it can be done, so I don’t mind anymore.
Yes, I’m a feminist, because I see all women as smart, gifted and tough.
You have to be very focused and work very hard, but it is not about working hard without knowing what your aim is!
Architecture is really about well-being. I think that people want to feel good in a space… On the one hand it’s about shelter, but it’s also about pleasure. The intention is to really carve out of a city civic spaces and the more it is accessible to a much larger mass in public and it’s about people enjoying that space. That makes life that much better. If you think about housing, education, whether schools and hospitals, these are all very interesting projects because in the way you interpret this special experience.
Different projects give you satisfaction in different ways.
I am eccentric, I admit it, but I am not a nutcase.
I think about architecture all the time. That’s the problem. But I’ve always been like that. I dream it sometimes.
I’ve always thought that design can have equal importance to the idea of internal architecture. Professionally, things can be very dogmatic – you do the architecture, someone else does the interiors, someone else does the furniture, the fabric, etc. But I think design is all-encompassing.
As a woman, I’m expected to want everything to be nice and to be nice myself. A very English thing. I don’t design nice buildings – I don’t like them. I like architecture to have some raw, vital, earthy quality.
Of course I believe imaginative architecture can make a difference to people’s lives, but I wish it was possible to divert some of the effort we put into ambitious museums and galleries into the basic architectural building blocks of society.
