We should attempt to bring nature, houses, and human beings together in a higher unity.
— Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
Behrens had a great sense of the great form. that was his main interest; and that I certainly understood and learned from him.
What would life be like if everybody insisted you must have actually built such-and-such a thing by yourself? I'd be an old man and have nothing to show for the aging.
I especially remember that on All Souls Day, when so many people wanted new monuments for the graves, our whole family pitched in. I did the lettering on the stones, my brother did the carving, and my sisters put the finishing touches on them, the gold leaf and all that.
It took me a long time to understand the relationship between ideas and between objective facts. But after I clearly understood this relationship, I didn't fool around with other wild ideas. That is one of the main reasons why I just make my scheme as simple as possible.
Most of our designs are developed long before there is a practical possibility of carrying them out. I do that on purpose and have done it all my life. I do it when I am interested in something.
I think that an industrial process is not like a rubber stamp. Everything has to be put together and, as such, should have its own expression.
Means must be subsidiary to ends and to our desire for dignity and value.
Architecture is the will of an epoch translated into space.
God is in the details.
The architect must get to know the people who will live in the planned house. From their needs, the rest inevitably follows.
After my time in Holland, an inner battle ensued in which I tried to free myself from the influence of Schinkelesque classicism.
The problem of architecture has always been the same throughout time. Its authentic quality is reached through its proportions, and the proportions cost nothing. In fact, most of them are proportions among things, not the things themselves. Art is almost always a question of proportions.
We made drawings the size of a whole quarter of a room ceiling, which we would then send on to the model makers. I did this every day for two years. Even now I can draw cartouches with my eyes closed.
We have to know that life cannot be changed by us. It will be changed. But not by us. We can only guide the things that can cause physical change.
It is much better to have just one idea, and if the idea is clear, then you can fight for it. That is how you can get things done.
Generally, I think my work has so much influence because of its reasonableness.
I do not think it is an advantage to build planned packaged houses. If you prefabricate a house completely, it becomes an unnecessary restriction.
A chair is a very difficult object. A skyscraper is almost easier. That is why Chippendale is famous.
Architecture starts when you carefully put two bricks together. There it begins.
I don't want to be interesting. I want to be good.
In addition to the wishes of the client, the position, orientation, and size of the plot also play an important role in determining the final plan of the house. The 'where' and 'how' of the exterior then follows naturally from all of that.
You can teach students how to work; you can teach them technique - how to use reason; you can even give them a sense of proportions - of order. You can teach them general principles.
Cheese was the staple. Bread you brought from home. The Schnaps came later. At the end of the week when people got paid, that's when you got your Schnaps, lots of it, five Pfennige a shot.
It is no use working with other architects. What can they do? Who does what?
Never talk to a client about architecture. Talk to him about his children. That is simply good politics. he will not understand what you have to say about architecture most of the time.
You can use up all the slums for new development. In all the cities of the world, there are large areas of these. Also, you can avoid the spread of these silly suburban houses. Chicago has thousands of them all over the place.
True education is concerned not only with practical goals but also with values. Our aims assure us of our material life, our values make possible our spiritual life.
Simply by not owning three medium-sized castles in Tuscany I have saved enough money in the last forty years on insurance premiums alone to buy a medium-sized castle in Tuscany.
Less is more.
The building art is, in reality, always the spatial execution of spiritual decisions. It is bound to its times and manifests itself only in addressing vital tasks with the means of its times. A knowledge of the times, its tasks, and its means is the necessary precondition of work in the building art.
