Thomas Heatherwick

I'm in love with cities. I find them amazing, the quiet co-ordination of thousands of people, going about what we're trying to do, and that organism of the city nurturing human aspiration, and the actual city fabric itself being a special thing rather than just infrastructure.

I studied at a time when buildings were sterile things, and their creators were hands-off people - super-intelligent people, but you felt they didn't love the stuff buildings are made from.

It's important for people who criticise architects - whether what they build is or isn't to your taste - to appreciate how they devote themselves and put everything into bringing a building into existence.

You can make people feel valued or cared for by design alone. It's not purely about money. It's about how we choose to value human experience.

The Garden Bridge has not found its right moment, but I hope one day it will and that London continues to be open to ideas that make life here better.

Historically, in the world of architecture, enormous amounts of care and energy have been lavished on things that are almost a cliched idea of culture.

I don't enjoy the sound of my voice in front of other people.

I try to be a positive person, but I'm also always looking and wondering, 'Maybe this could be done differently.' As soon as your mind is in a critical mode, you're halfway through designing; as soon as you start thinking about whether something could be better, you're already halfway through a solution.

When I heard of the 'garden bridge' idea, it seemed so clear and powerful, the notion of using nature to scale down an enormous piece of potentially wind-swept exposed link. That's what struck me - not treating the bridge just as a link, but as a place.

I think that human nature is scared of change and justifies it in all sort of ways.

For me, every one of our projects is a research-and-development project.

Often the most important moment in the design process is figuring out what the right question is.