“If you're lucky, and a building succeeds, the real product has many mo...” — Peter Zumthor Quote

If you're lucky, and a building succeeds, the real product has many more dimensions than you can ever imagine. You have the sun, the light, the rain, the birds, the feel.

Normally, architects render a service. They implement what other people want. This is not what I do. I like to develop the use of the building together with the client, in a process, so that as we go along we become more intelligent.

I grew up in a craftsman's home, where things were done with our own hands. I did cabinetmaking for four years and I hated it.

If, early on, you know how things are put together, then you can build. The architect is in charge of making - he is not an artist.

Thank God I have parents who'd support the crazy things I did. If my dad found a snake, I'd take it to the woods. I was always taking these homeless birds and homeless cats home.

We have an uncanny ability to make birds do what we want them to do. In Blood Simple there's a shot from the bumper of a car and it's going up this road and a huge flock of birds takes off at the perfect moment.

If worms carried pistols, birds wouldn't eat 'em.

What I was trying to convey there was the kind of waste land that was left after the war. It was a bit like one always thinks of war, you know, stark scenery and no birds, no trees, no leaves, nothing living. And just emptiness.