In order to design buildings with a sensuous connection to life, one must think in a way that goes far beyond form and construction.
Interpretation
Designing buildings requires a deeper understanding of life beyond mere aesthetics and technical aspects.
This quote emphasizes that true architectural design transcends basic structural considerations and formal aesthetics. To create spaces that resonate with human experiences and emotions, architects need to engage with the essence of life itself, embracing a holistic approach that values sensory and emotional connections over mere functionality.
In practice
In a presentation about architectural philosophy, this quote can illustrate the importance of understanding human experience in design.
If you look at the Earth without architecture, its sometimes a little bit unpleasant. So there is this basic human need to do shelter in the broadest sense of the word, whether its a movie theater or a simple log cabin in the mountains. This is the core of architecture: To provide a space for human beings.
There is still a real need for good quality architecture, not paper architecture, but the real stuff.
I think the chance of finding beauty is higher if you don't work on it directly. Beauty in architecture is driven by practicality. This is what you learn from studying the old townscapes of the Swiss farmers.
Designing is a matter of concentration. You go deep into what you want to do. It's about intensive research, really. The concentration is warm and intimate and like the fire inside the earth - intense but not distorted. You can go to a place, really feel it in your heart. It's actually a beautiful feeling.
Architecture to me is whole. I cannot say I only care about this 25% and the other 75% I let go... it's just I want to work the way I want to work. In my shop, you can order certain things and other things you cannot. They are not available.
I design for the use of a building and the place and for the people who use it... the reputation for arrogance comes because when work is offered to me, I look whether I can find a genuine interest in quality.
The groove is so mysterious. We're born with it and we lose it and the world seems to split apart before our eyes into stupid and cool. When we get it back, the world unifies around us, and both stupid and cool fall away. I am grateful to those who are keepers of the groove. The babies and the grandmas who hang on to it and help us remember when we forget that any kind of dancing is better than no dancing at all.
The origins of poetry are clearly rooted in obscurity, in secretiveness, in incantation, in spells that must at once invoke and protect, tell the secret and keep it.
What is really beautiful must always be true.
The ballet needs to tell its own story in such a way it can be received without having to be translated into language.
Your acting will not be good until it is only yours. That's true of music, acting, anything creative. You work until finally nobody is acting like you.
When she started to play, Steinway came down personally and rubbed his name off the piano.
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