Famous Architect Quotes
1.”Less is more”- Mies Van Der Rohe
The maxim “less is more,” initially used by architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, serves as an example of minimalism. This method entails reducing a design to its basic minimum and eliminating any components that do not enhance the product or space’s inherent beauty or functionality.
- “Less is bore” – Robert Venturi
This famous architect quote stands for the Maximalist approach. In contradiction to minimalism, Venturi coined this quote for post-modern architecture that embraces expressive forms and ornamentation
- “Architecture should speak of its time and place, but yearn for timelessness” – Frank Gehry
This powerful quote talks about how architecture, while learning from history, should talk about the time of its creation and respond to the place where it is built. The essence of this timeless architecture is to make people feel the ambiance of the past, to travel them back to its time in order to introduce the primitive way of life.
- “Architecture is the learned game, correct and magnificent, of forms assembled in the light” – Le Corbusier.One quote that summarizes his work, Le Corbusier considers all architecture to be a game of the way light interacts with the space
- “Books are lasting longer than (built) architecture. Most of my important projects may never be built, so buildings are important, artifacts are important, but so are books”- Peter Eisenmann
Spaces built and experienced showcase an architect’s skills, but books verbalize the thoughts and the processes that often stay hidden in the final product.
6..“As an architect, you design for the present, with an awareness of the past for a future which is essentially unknown” – Norman Foster
The space designed should have respect for its history, respond to the present conditions and be adaptable to the uncertainty of the future.
7.” House is a grain, like a small sapling in the bio-diverse wild forest” – B.V. Doshi
A house for a client is always a part of a larger whole, a bigger context. Cities are systems made up of these individual houses.
8.”Architecture domestics limitless space and enables us to inhibit it” – Juhani Pallasmaa
9.”Form follows function” – Louis Sullivan
In this famous architect quote, one of the original theories, where functions govern the design of buildings.
- “Details, when they are successful, are not mere decoration. They do not distract or entertain. They lead to an understanding of the whole of which they are an inherent part” – Peter Zumthor.
11.”The most important things are the experience- the rasa, which is the subtle experience of the space that makes the space memorable.” – B.V. Doshi
Architecture is primarily about creating experiences that are guided by both form and function.
- “There are no straight lines or sharp corners in nature. Therefore, buildings must have no straight lines or sharp corners” – Antonio Gaudi
Gaudi who took inspiration from nature and broke the unspoken rule of right angles and straight lines in architecture
- “Any architectural work that does not express serenity is an error” – Luis Barragán
Barragan always brought a sense of calmness in all his works- private or public
- “The difference between good and bad architecture is the time you spend on it” – David Chipperfield
The process is always more important than the product.
- “The fundamental characteristics of futuristic architecture will be expendability and transience. Our house will last less time than we do, every generation must make its own city” – Archigram
16.”I don’t think that architecture is only about shelter, is only about a very simple enclosure. It should be able to excite you, to calm you, to make you think.” – Zaha Hadid
- “There are 360 degrees, so why stick to one?” – Zaha Hadid
- “We borrow from nature the space upon which we build.”- Ando
- “An idea is salvation by imagination.” – Frank Lloyd Wright
20.“A doctor can bury his mistakes, but an architect can only advise his clients to plant vines.” – Frank Lloyd Wright
- “To provide meaningful architecture is not to parody history but to articulate it.” – Daniel Libeskind
- “To create, one must first question everything.” – Eileen Gray
The core fundamentals of architecture require questioning the obvious, the norms.
- “One of the great beauties of architecture is that each time, it is like life starting all over again.” – Renzo Piano
- “The mother art is architecture. Without an architecture of our own we have no soul of our own civilization.” – Frank Lloyd Wright
- 25. “Buildings are deeply emotive structures which form our psyche” – David Adjaye
- 26. “Recognizing the need is the primary condition for design.” -Charles Eames
- 27. “For me, architecture is a social act.” – David Adjaye
- 28. “I try to give people a different way of looking at their surroundings. That’s art to me.” – Maya Lin
- “I believe that architecture today needs to reflect on the task and possibilities which are inherently its own. ” – Peter Zumthor
Architecture is not a vehicle or a symbol for things that do not belong to its essence. In a society that celebrates the inessential, architecture can put up a resistance, counteract the waste of forms and meanings, and speak its own language.
- ” Visit the site often, give a patient ear to its murmurs.” – B.V. Doshi