I am a Brazilian before I am an architect. I cannot separate the two.

Sometimes I lose a whole morning waiting on journalists and other people who look for me. But I always find some time for reading, talking to my friends and feeling what is happening in this world.

Life is more important than architecture.

We have to have dreams, even if they never come true.

Right angles don't attract me. Nor straight, hard and inflexible lines created by man.

My ambition has always been to reduce a building's support to a minimum. The more we diminish supporting structures, the more audacious and important the architecture is. That has been my life's work.

Architecture was my way of expressing my ideals: to be simple, to create a world equal to everyone, to look at people with optimism, that everyone has a gift. I don’t want anything but general happiness. Why is that bad?