No matter what an architect may be at home, he becomes a monumentalist when he comes to Washington.

No matter what an architect may be at home, he becomes a monumentalist when he comes to Washington.

The building is a national tragedy - a cross between a concrete candy box and a marble sarcophagus in which the art of architecture lies buried.

Surrogate experience and surrogate environments have become the American way of life. Distinctions are no longer made, or deemed necessary, between the real and the false; the edge usually goes to the latter, as an improved version with defects corrected - accessible and user-friendly.

Embellishment is an irresistible and consuming impulse, going back to the beginnings of human history. ... Probably the strongest motivating force is the simplest: the inability of almost everyone to ever leave well enough alone.

the search for the ultimate skyscraper goes on. ... At worst, overbuilding will make urban life unbearable. At best, we will go out in a blaze of style.

Really living without clutter takes an iron will ... This involves eternal watchfulness and that oldest and most relentless of the housewife's occupations, picking up. I have a feeling that picking up will go on long after ways have been found to circumvent death and taxes.