It is insufficient for architecture today to directly implement an existing building typology; it instead requires architects to carefully examine the whole area with new interventions and programmatic typologies

Of course there is a lot of fluidity now between art, architecture and fashion - a lot more cross-pollination in the disciplines, but this isn't about competition, it's about collaboration and what these practices and processes can contribute to one another.

Different projects give you satisfaction in different ways.

When I first came to Guangzhou in 1981, it seemed such a hard and dour place with everyone in Chairman Mao uniforms.

I am quite sensitive to politics, because you know, as an Arab, an Iraqi, all your life, you are very conscious of it.

For many years, I hated nature. As a student, I refused to put a plant anywhere - a living plant, that is. Dead plants were OK.

Life in the Middle East is quite different from other places.