Asia is still dominated by skyscrapers. I hope that, in European cities, it will become a declining trend. They were almost never necessary.

Influence is a very unpleasant subject and I deal with it in a maybe irresponsible way, which is to really ignore it. It would be a nightmare if we started to really think about it; it would tie our hands, it would tie everyone elses hands.

In Lagos there's a really strong case to resurrect strong parts. Embedded in all of it are some amazing pieces of planning, amazing pieces of engineering and interaction. For instance, the campus of Lagos University is stunningly beautiful, efficient and generous, and that needs to be recognised and preserved.

Let's put it this way: One can be happy or unhappy in a building. But some buildings make us more depressed than others.

There is no plateau of resting or stabilising. Once you are interested in how things evolve, you have a kind of never-ending perspective, because it means you are interested in articulating the evolution, and therefore the potential change, the potential redefinition.

The luxury of our position now is that we can almost assemble any team to address any issue.

That has been another interesting discovery: that basically a city [Lagos] could recover from a really deep, deep, deep pit.