Of all the lessons most relevant to architecture today, Japanese flexibility is the greatest.

The Romans used every housing form known today and they have a remarkably modern look.

In the East there is a gap between the top of the wall and the underside of the roof; the wall does not act as a support. Instead, it acts as a screen, and the Chinese were able to use it as they wished.

In the Scottish Orkneys, the little stone houses with their single large room and central hearth had an extraordinary range of built-in furniture.

The interior of the house personifies the private world; the exterior of it is part of the outside world.

The ancient Greeks noticed that a man with arms and legs extended described a circle, with his navel as the center.

Land is the secure ground of home, the sea is like life, the outside, the unknown.