The earth is round, all the heavenly bodies are round; they all move on round or elliptical orbits. This same image of circular globe-shaped mini worlds orbiting around each other follows us right down to the microcosmos. We are even aroused by round forms in species propagation related eroticism. Why should I join the straying mass who want to make everything angular? I am going to pursue Galileo Galilei's philosophy: my world is also round.

It took two years of me telling Canon engineers that a camera is a thing between the human hand and the human eye, so it had to have ergonomics on both sides! They got the message, and we did it, and overnight it was the camera of the world. Everyone - Nikon, Yashica, Sony - all copied Colani.

Everybody in Germany was for the -German cause. But then, after the war ended, when I heard the first Glenn Miller sound on the radio and these fantastic American music makers, I turned into a jazz fanatic. They called me Benny, after Benny Goodman. So, all of a sudden, the eyes of young Germans were opened to America - everything American was absolutely at the top of the list.

I was 3 years old, and we had a very rich neighbor in Berlin who drove a Mercedes sports car. I remember standing behind this car, admiring the trunk, how nicely shaped it was, for an hour. That shape has never left me - I could design it today!

If I had been president, I would have come out and declared: "Nothing there, ever! This place stays as it is. We make a big place there where people can pray about the errors we have made that those two towers had to fall."

Look at nature - look at birds, look at fish. Things that look good, work good. People don't get the message of ergonomics.

You see, if you are 30 years ahead of your time, you will always have difficulty speaking with the bosses in the industry. They are too conservative.