Richard Rogers

“Cities depend on a healthy mix of uses and people for their vitality. As a pre-eminent world city, London is a magnet to people from across the globe.”

“The Athenians had an oath for someone who was about to become a citizen. They had to swear that 'I shall leave the city not less but more beautiful than I found it.'”

“Architects are not clients. We can't build without something to built.”

“I don't believe in the ownership of work.”

“Architecture is a slow business, and city planning even slower.”

“When I started out, nearly every architect I knew was working in public practice; that's where the radical thinking was done. But, there's always a danger of looking back as our fathers did and saying, 'Things were better then.'”

“My mother was very family-oriented. And I do love being with my children.”

“If I remember rightly Holland for instance has something like 45, and it's a much smaller country. In comparison we have very few and they are very badly financed.”

“I believe very much in a dialogue between buildings - I believe it's always been there. I think buildings have different identities and live very well next to each other. We always have the shock of the new, and that's fine. The renaissance style is totally different from the medieval, and they have a dialogue across time.”

“Dyslexia, though, made me realise that people who say 'but you can't do that' aren't actually very important. I don't take 'no' too seriously.”

“One of the things you see in New York is that offices keep their lights on at night. They're proud of their building. Great. But they must find another way to be proud without draining energy.”

“My parents always told me that nothing was impossible.”

“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.”

“I think we did a pretty good role, linking, being a sounding board really and a driving force, especially from the bottom up. I think that part of this is bottom up as well as top down.”

“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.”

“Watching TV on your own is not very inspiring. But meeting people is where you get new ideas and get things done.”

“The only way forward, if we are going to improve the quality of the environment, is to get everybody involved.”

“Cities are about juxtaposition.”

“Architects design buildings; that's what we do, so we have to go with the flow; and, even though I'm still an old Leftie, global capitalism does have its good side. It's broken down barriers - the Berlin Wall, the Soviet Union - it's raised a lot of people up economically, and for architects, it has meant that we can work around the world.”

“I think you could make a completely Virtual Centre, though I have a general feeling, and maybe because I am getting very old, that you still need face to face.”