Genevieve Gorder Quotes

Architecture is one of the art forms best able to improve and revitalise cities both artistically and functionally.

We're producing spaces that accommodate human activity. And what I'm interested in is not the styling of that, but the relationship of that as it enhances that activity. And that directly connects to ideas of city-making.

London is one of the most civilised places in the world for the procedure of making architecture and urban design.

But there is so much more to do for the city we love... a Dallas with roads as strong as our businesses, parks as beautiful as our children, a downtown as tall as our imagination.

Our cities need to change, fast. Tactical Urbanism is a guided tour of solutions created when local people decide they can't wait for politics to catch up before they improve their neighborhoods. This weathervane book deserves a place on any urbanist's bookshelf.

You can neither lie to a neighbourhood park, nor reason with it. 'Artist's conceptions' and persuasive renderings can put pictures of life into proposed neighbourhood parks or park malls, and verbal rationalizations can conjure up users who ought to appreciate them, but in real life only diverse surroundings have the practical power of inducing a natural, continuing flow of life and use.

I wanted to improve the suburban office building; to create a great urban space in a suburban environment with all that implies about interaction, collaboration and creativity.

The arts can play a vital role in revitalizing neighborhoods, using and improving vacant space, bringing new jobs and new sense of opportunity, and improving public safety by generating more foot traffic and more eyes on the street.

I love cities, I spend most of my life talking about cities. And the design of cities does have an effect on your life. You're lucky if you can see trees out of your window and you have a square nearby, or a bar, a cornershop, a surgery. Then you're living well.

Planning a garden, park, building, or city shouldn't be done in an office.

Livable neighborhoods with a vibrant street life will stimulate our economic life as well.

Princeton University's campus environment presents unique challenges and opportunities for architecture to act as a social condenser.

Cities are about juxtaposition. In Florence, classical buildings sit against medieval buildings. It's that contrast we like. In Bordeaux, we built law courts right next door to what is effectively a listed historic building, and that makes it exciting.

I see the people in Detroit are very - they're like a lot of cities, but they're very proud to be from there and they really want to see change and they really want to see good things happen.

The Round-Up is a wonderful community celebration, and I greatly enjoy the chance to visit with residents and see so many families enjoying the festivities offered throughout the week.

But I absolutely believe that architecture is a social activity that has to do with some sort of communication or places of interaction, and that to change the environment is to change behaviour.

As architects we are often involved in the concrete-steel-and-glass aspect of it, but cities are social structures, and to be involved in imagining the future of cities and the type of relationships and the types of places that we're making is something that intrigues me very much.

Fiorello LaGuardia saved City Center. The real man saved it, and he made this building into a performing arts venue.

If you don’t put positive things in the city’s open spaces, they will be filled by negative things.

My studio's passion is improving the public experience of cities for everyone.

We try to respond as closely as we can to the nature of each city, to the traditions, to their expectations. I don't believe that architects should be imposing their style or their plans on every city in the world.

Like all things, cities must change - even a city as enamoured of the past and memory as D.C.

Personally, what I would like the most is to work on a project that would aid the historic rehabilitation of Havana. It's a shame - and it gives me tremendous sadness - to see the precious buildings, to see a city, which could be the most beautiful in Latin America, falling apart and with very little money for renovations.

Most of the job on DDP was already done by the time I became mayor. So was Gwanghwamun Square, described by many architects as the city's worst architectural creation, and the new city hall. I did not think that redoing them would be the right approach as that would only create new problems.

I am very passionate, and I grew up in an incredibly beautiful urban community - the city of Detroit - born and raised.