No architect troubled to design houses that suited people who were to live in them, because that would have meant building a whole range of different houses. It was far cheaper and, above all, timesaving to make them identical.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Some architects, such as John Lautner, never really did anything other than houses. His entire portfolio is basically residential. There's nothing wrong with that.
I could have been an architect, but I don't think I'd have been very happy. Nearly all modern architecture is a silly game as far as I can see.
If architecture had nothing to do with art, it would be astonishingly easy to build houses, but the architect's task - his most difficult task - is always that of selecting.
I tell you, it is easier to build a grand opera or a city center than to build a personal house.
The bungalow had more to do with how Americans live today than any other building that has gone remotely by the name of architecture in our history.
I think that the point of being an architect is to help raise the experience of everyday living, even a little. Putting a window where people would really like one. Making sure a shaving mirror in a hotel bathroom is at the right angle. Making bureaucratic buildings that are somehow cheerful.
It is not possible to design always the same. How to be different in each different place - that is the most important work and duty of the architect to find out.
Frank Lloyd Wright made houses right up until the end. I think that's important because it gives you a direct connection to all the basic aspects of architecture - the spatial energy of the place, the construction, the materials, the site, the detail.
In other words, each piece of the building must look as though it was designed for that particular building.
I am an architect at heart. I designed every home I've ever had, plus my studio.