I am much more passionate about cities than I am about nations. The competition between cities is more civilised than between nations. There is an understanding there.

I think greed is a critical problem - the gap between the poor and the rich. The gap between the top 10 percent and the bottom 10 percent.

Form follows profit is the aesthetic principle of our times.

Architecture is measured against the past; you build in the future, and you try to imagine the future.

I had a basic plan for my life. The plan was - 20s: make money; 30s: have family; and 40s: run for something and do politics. When I retired, I wanted to be a teacher.

I'm a family man. I like being home.

Essentially, I spent most of my childhood with my mother and my older sister, and I suppose I had rather a romantic vision of how things might be if there were men around; I saw myself in a country house with six children and a garden. That has never been achieved - and I still regret it.

From the time you are a tiny baby, a parent's love is usually unconditional. Whatever you do, your parents think you are the tops, but when their memory goes, you stop recouping the love you've put in.