“Great artists need great clients.”

“I believe that architecture is a pragmatic art. To become art it must be built on a foundation of necessity.”

“Contemporary architects tend to impose modernity on something. There is a certain concern for history but its not very deep. I understand that time has changed, we have evolved. But I dont want to ...”

“I want to bring out the best in a community and contribute something of permanent value.”

“At the beginning, I thought the best Islamic work was in Spain - the mosque in Cordoba, the Alhambra in Granada. But as I learned more, my ideas shifted. I traveled to Egypt, and to the Middle East...”

“Stop worrying about missed opportunities and start looking for new ones.”

“Thus nature provides a system for proportioning the growth of plants that satisfies the three canons of architecture. All modules are isotropic and they are related to the whole structure of the pl...”

“We therefore find that the triangles and rectangles herein described, enclose a large majority of the temples and cathedrals of the Greek and Gothic masters, for we have seen that the rectangle of ...”

“I saw cities, and roads of marvelous construction. I saw cruelty and greed, but I've seen them here too. I saw a people live a life that was strange in many ways, but also much the same as anywhere...”

“If you want to understand what's most important to a society, don't examine its art or literature, simply look at its biggest buildings.”

“I'll never get over the factthat the buildings all light up at night,and the night comes every nightand without regret we let it go.We sleep a little and we live.That's what we do.”

“We depend on our surroundings obliquely to embody the moods and ideas we respect and then to remind us of them. We look to our buildings to hold us, like a kind of psychological mould, to a helpful...”