One of my unsung heroes is Erich Mendelsohn. I met him when I was a student and he was a cranky old man and very unpleasant. But if you go to his Einstein Tower in Potsdam, Germany you see an enormous intellect at work with a language that was personal and new. It has a sense of urban design and of theater and procession I hadn't seen before.

I hate the word starchitect. Stuff like that comes from mean-spirited, untalented journalists. It's demeaning.

If the general public demanded better, they'd get better, because the market­place responds to the public's needs and desires.

In an ideal world, pressure should come from below and from the top.

If you're serious about being an architect, you've got to learn how to take responsibility. It's not fluff. You have to do every detail on every bloody piece of the building. You have to know how the engineering works. You have to know how the fittings go together. You have to master the mechanical, electrical, acoustical - everything.

I used to sketch - that's the way I thought out loud. Then they made a book of my sketches, and I got self-conscious, so now I don't do it much.

Architecture and any art can transform a person, even save someone. It can for children - for anyone. It still does for me.