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" It is wonderful to be in the country in a glass house, because no matter what happens out there, you're nice and safe, you know, cuddled in your little bed, and there it is, raging storms, snowing - wonderful. "

Philip Johnson

House

Country

Know

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" I haven't any wisdom - just a child like everybody else. I'm not as great as Frank Lloyd Wright. "

" Glibness will get your anywhere. "

" You cannot not know history. "

" The people with money to build today are corporations - they are our popes and Medicis. The sense of pride is why they build. "

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

" I used to think that each phase of life was the end. But now that my view on life is more or less fixed, I believe that change is a great thing. In fact, it's the only real absolute in the world. "

" I hate vacations. If you can build buildings, why sit on the beach? "

" In my own work, I'd say I'm a classicist, but I look everywhere for my solutions. I don't study the toilet-living habits of my clients, although that's a popular approach. First, I think of every building in history that has been similar in purpose. Then I think of the functional program - that's a major part of the study. "

" Maybe, just maybe, we shall at last come to care for the most important, most challenging, surely the most satisfying of all architectural creations: building cities for people to live in. "

" I always think of buildings in their settings, but so do other architects. "

" Faith? Haven't any. I'm not a nihilist or a relativist. I don't believe in anything but change. I'm a Heraclitean - you can't step in the same river twice. "

" Purpose is not necessary to make a building beautiful. "

" I wish someone would ask me to design a cathedral. "

Philip Johnson

I Wish

Someone

" How does an artist know when the line that he just painted is good or not good? That's the catch. De Kooning was the greatest of my contemporaries in art, and he knew when he'd done a good line. When he didn't, he threw it away. I wish I'd thrown away some of mine. "

" I call myself a traditionalist, although I have fought against tradition all my life. "

" Houston is undoubtedly my showcase city. I saved all my best buildings for Houston. "

" I'm a chameleon, so changeable. I see myself as a gadfly and a questioner. "

" Processionalism is primary - how you get from one place to another, the relationships and effects of spaces as you move about in them. That's worked out awfully well in the State Theater. I'm a 'straight-in' man myself; I'm too nervous, I like to know where I am. I also like to know where I'm going. "

" There's no worse feeling than seeing my buildings and realizing the mistakes. "

" Anybody can build a building, putting some doors into it, but how many times have you been in a building that moves you to tears the way Beethoven's 'Eighth' does? "

" There's no such thing as old age. I'm no different now than I was 50 years ago. I'm just having more fun. "

" Architecture is art, nothing else. "

" I wouldn't build a building if it wasn't of interest to me as a potential work of art. Why should I? "

Philip Johnson

Art

Why

" 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. "

" Don't build a glass house if you're worried about saving money on heating. "

" The future of architecture is culture. "

" All architects want to live beyond their deaths. "

" Architecture is the art of how to waste space. "

" I got everything from someone. Nobody can be original. "

" I like to be buttoned onto tradition. The thing is to improve it, twist it and mold it; to make something new of it; not to deny it. The riches of history can be plucked at any point. "

Philip Johnson

Improve

Tradition