Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App

" Architects think that beauty is a crime. "

Related Quotes:

" Oscar Niemeyer really inspired me. He's from South America, where nature has meaning. And his architecture was not expensive or high tech but artistic and spiritual. I like that. "

" When I started university, I didn't know much about architecture, so I flipped through a lot of magazines, looking at different and exciting images from all over the world. I thought that architecture could be interesting. "

" Sometimes I sketch and then scan my sketch directly to make the curves more freehand. I don't want to make perfect industrial curves. "

" What if we treat the high-rise like a mountain, or we have gardens in the sky, or waterfalls? I think that's the most challenging thing I want to try in my architecture. "

" Although we're architects, we believe we do culture; architecture is culture, and the topics we tackle will always arise a broader debate. "

" China has some cities, traditional cities, with a long history. They are so beautiful, and they were planned so smartly. I call them gardens on the city scale. For example, Beijing has mountains, waters, lakes, bridges, towers. It was a very poetic city. "

" A lot of ancient poetry sees in nature a reflection of human emotions, and in a post-industrialized era, once people have become more aware of the necessity of a more harmonious relation between man and nature, we need to build cities which can connect with human spiritual needs instead of being merely functional. "

" We need to be brave and tell the politicians what a better future could be. "

" Architecture is about experience: not only visual but also what you can touch, what you can feel. "

" If we're talking about the urban landscape as an advanced, forward-thinking art form, there must be some intellectual thinking involved. "

" Chinese people need to be aware of their present and ask, 'What's our culture? What can we bring to the world?' I don't think there's anything wrong with that. "

" I think, in our modern cities, there are a lot of boxes; there are a lot of straight lines. They often deal with efficiency, the function, the structure. "

" I think architecture should be a stage, not something too material - more of an environment, not a product. "

" The architecture scene in China is the most open and free climate compared to many other places. You can find many opportunities. "

" I would say that many architects are very logical. They start their process from analysis and from rational processes to try and find the 'right' answer, like solving a mathematic equation. "

" The city of the future development will be shifted from the pursuit of material civilisation to the pursuit of nature. This is what happens after human beings experience industrial civilisation at the expense of the natural environment. "

" Historically, sci-fi movies have played an important role in inspiring young people. "

" We need architects to be visionaries. "

" We proposed Tiananmen Square - this very empty political square in the city centre - should turn green. Maybe in the future, this space could become a very human and open urban space. And if that happens, I think that all the cities around China will follow to change. "

" Since the Industrial Revolution, we tend to use technology to show our power: you know, we build high-rises, towers, big buildings that become symbols of power and capitalism. We don't talk about how emotions and nature can be connected. "

" People can live in nature, and they won't necessarily destroy it. "

" 'Shan shui' you can literally translate as 'mountain and water.' In traditional Chinese culture, there are a lot of paintings about shan shui, but now we're talking about a shan-shui city. "

" I grew up in the old neighborhood of Beijing where you had a courtyard and trees. Actually, the whole of Beijing was a garden - the Forbidden City - and the lakes and gardens in the city center were all artificial. "

" The way a human can coexist with nature has to be at the spiritual level. "

" When I graduated from high school, I thought I wanted to make science fiction movies, so I applied to film school, but I couldn't get in. A professor told me I should try architecture instead. "

" A pool at the edge of the ocean is the simplest geometry, yet you feel connected to the sea. In a forest with the mountains in the background, you also feel the connection to nature, yet it's a very complex geometry. I think architecture is about controlling these feelings. "

" People think that buildings are permanent, but in China, this isn't true; we can always demolish and remake it better. "

" The world itself is already a great textbook. "

" We need to enter a new era to make nature and humans more emotionally connected in modern cities. "

" I actually feel like a very traditional architect. "