I loved logic, math, computer programming. I loved systems and logic approaches. And so I just figured architecture is this perfect combination.

I started studying what the nature of a monument is and what a monument should be. And for the World War III memorial I designed a futile, almost terrifying passage that ends nowhere.

When I was building the Vietnam Memorial, I never once asked the veterans what it was like in the war, because from my point of view, you don't pry into other people's business.

The definition of a modern approach to war is the acknowledgement of individual lives lost.

It's only in hindsight that you realize what indeed your childhood was really like.

For the most part things never get built the way they were drawn.

I was always making things. Even though art was what I did every day, it didn't even occur to me that I would be an artist.