A building has at least two lives - the one imagined by its maker and the life it lives afterward - and they are never the same.

The stronger the identity, the more it imprisons, the more it resists expansion, interpretation, renewal, contradiction.

Lagos has also had a particular effect on my career. I was there early, and although it was a courageous step to go there and invest on this scale - I went there maybe 20 times - it's also been also super-controversial. There's an old school of thought that somebody like me has no place to go there.Because of colonialism and so on.

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

You need to look at inequality as a typical condition of modern society.

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.

We say we want to create beauty, identity, quality, singularity. And yet, maybe in truth these cities that we have are desired. Maybe their very characterlessness provides the best context for living.