Neri Oxman

“I don't think of fashion as fashion or biology as biology.”

“Could we design an all-glass building with internal channels and networks for airflow and water circulation? Can we surpass the great modern tradition of discrete formal and functional partitions and generate an all-in-one building skin?”

“Rarely do we see immediate use of innovative technologies. I believe that the future is built by small pieces that add up.”

“Unlike a pressed or blown-glass part, which traditionally has smooth internal surface features, a printed part can have complex surface features on the inside as well as the outside.”

“The future of design is a future where anything material in the environment - whether it's wearables, cars, buildings - can be designed with this variation of properties and relationship with the environment that can take part in the natural ecology.”

“I loathe categorization. I cherish my independence, and I treasure chivalry. I live just fine with ambiguity, and I welcome a good quarrel about all things designed or grown - except for when men misnomer 'confident' with 'poised' and 'passionate' with 'feisty.' I work hard.”

“It is only through hard work and awareness that we can truly own our identity.”

“I believe in the balance between dreaming and building.”

“Our facial skins are thin with large pores; our back skins are thicker with small pores. One acts mainly as filter, the other mainly as barrier. And yet, it's the same skin, no parts, no assemblies. It's a system that gradually varies its functionality by varying elasticity.”

“There is a very beautiful expression in the Hebrew language that's borrowed from spoken Torah... 'All is predicted, and permission is given at any point to change anything.' I think I live by this idiom in the sense that there is always a goal; there is always something to look forward to in life and my creative search, and that goal is there.”

“I often ask myself, 'What would design be like if objects were made of a single part? Would we return to a better state of creation?'”

“Nature is a brilliant engineer and builder. It knows how to create seashells that are twice as strong as the most resistant ceramics human beings can manufacture, and it produces silk fibers five times stronger than steel. Nature also knows how to create multipurpose forms.”

“I don't think I would have made for a good doctor. It was not meant to be, and it took me a long time to realize that.”

“A great dream of mine would be to run a design studio full of scientists who think about science as creatively as if they were doing art.”

“If you think about it, the printing press allowed everyone to print books - it democratised the printing of information. For the first time, we could all print.”

“The second-most abundant biopolymer on the planet is called chitin, and some 100 million tons of it are produced every year by organisms such as shrimps, crabs, scorpions, and butterflies. We thought if we could tune its properties, we could generate structures that are multifunctional out of a single part.”

“Craft meets the machine in rapid fabrication. We can generate craft with the help of technology.”

“In the end, it's clear that the incorporation of synthetic biology in product and architectural design will enable the transition from designs that are inspired by nature to designs made with and by nature to, possibly, designing nature herself.”

“The most beautiful products or the most elegant or seductive products, in my mind, are those that tell a story of a process.”

“The 3D-printing technology has been developing at a very rapid pace.”