“Authentic architecture is not the incarnation of the spirit of the age but of the spirit, full stop.”

“The more you densify a city, the more congestion will increase, however technology changes... cities so packed that they will no longer function... vertical sprawl.”

“I don't build because I am an architect. I can make true architecture because I do not build.”

“If a dictator takes up my ideas, the resulting town will survive the political system that commissioned it and stand as a social good. Besides, modernism rather than classicism has dominated the architecture of totalitarian regimes of both the left and right.”

“Modernist architecture and town planning is inimical to human beings... based on the Darwinian concept that evolution is open ended, that there must always be something new and better.”

“You need a prince to make a town in an intellectual sense. Developers want to make money. If they cared about architecture, they'd become architects. I've had so many projects that never came off because they had no sponsor, and not because they were utopian. I just want to build a town that's normal.”

“Cities and landscapes are illustrations of our spiritual and material worth. They not only express our values but give them a tangible reality. They determine the way in which we use or squander our energy, time, and land resources.”

“A city is not an accident but the result of coherent visions and aims.”

“The rigidity of a bottle's form does not affect the fluidity of the liquid it contains.”

“Authentic architecture is not the incarnation of the spirit of the age but of the spirit, full stop.”

“Viewed from a certain distance and under good light, even an ugly city can look like the promised land.”