There are those airports which make you feel better, and there are those airports that, when you go there, your heart sinks: you can't wait to get out of there. They both function as airports, but it's the things that you can't measure that make them different.

Norman Foster

As an architect, you design for the present, with an awareness of the past, for a future which is essentially unknown.

Norman Foster

Everything we design is a response to the specific climate and culture of a particular place.

Norman Foster

I describe the design process as like the tip of the iceberg. What you don't see is the long haul: all the endless auditing and things like that.

Norman Foster

A life-threatening illness or two certainly gives you an awareness of your own mortality. It heightens your sense of gratitude for things that previously, if you've not taken them for granted, you perhaps never appreciated how precious they were. That's almost a platitude, but one has to state the obvious.

Norman Foster

There are those airports which make you feel better, and there are those airports that, when you go there, your heart sinks: you can't wait to get out of there. They both function as airports, but it's the things that you can't measure that make them different.

Norman Foster

When the Great Fire of London destroyed most of the medieval city in 1666, Christopher Wren was invited to design a new one. Within days, he had drawn up an elegant grid of broad boulevards leading to majestic squares, but it came to nothing - the existing landowners wanted things as they had been.

Norman Foster

I travel continuously, and I see many cities, but there is nowhere like London.

Norman Foster

I hope that any expansion of London will learn from the planning examples of some of its most desirable areas such as Chelsea, Notting Hill, Belgravia and Mayfair. All are characterised by high density and a generosity of green spaces. They are all pedestrian-friendly with shops, entertainment, restaurants and pubs within easy walking distance.

Norman Foster

Anything that reduces fuel consumption and cuts down on greenhouse gasses is good news.

Norman Foster

I'm not a creature of habit. I like to find things from unexpected sources.

Norman Foster

I was born in 1935, and as far back as I can remember, I was sketching designs. My first subject was an aircraft, which I imagined myself piloting.

Norman Foster

Every time I've flown an aircraft, or visited a steelworks, or watched a panel-beater at work, I've learned something new that can be applied to buildings.

Norman Foster

Joseph Bazalgette created a sewer system which he originally sized for London's needs of the time - he then doubled it to anticipate the future beyond. These are the qualities that I admire.

Norman Foster

Control is the wrong word. The practice is very much about sharing, and, in any creative practice, some individuals, whether partners or directors, are much closer to certain projects than I could ever be.

Norman Foster

The most amazing lesson in aerodynamics I ever had was the day I climbed a thermal in a glider at the same time as an eagle. I witnessed, close up, effortlessness and lightness combined with strength, precision and determination.

Norman Foster

You cannot separate the buildings out from the infrastructure of cites and the mobility of transit.

Norman Foster

I think you never stop learning.

Norman Foster

I love flying; I love aircraft, and you could say I've had a love affair with flight since I was a child. I travel a huge amount. I use airports, and as a pilot, I've flown in and out of airports thousands of times, so really, I have a fairly broad perspective.

Norman Foster

There's a snobbery at work in architecture. The subject is too often treated as a fine art, delicately wrapped in mumbo-jumbo. In reality, it's an all-embracing discipline taking in science, art, maths, engineering, climate, nature, politics, economics.

Norman Foster

Since Stonehenge, architects have always been at the cutting edge of technology. And you can't separate technology from the humanistic and spiritual content of a building.

Norman Foster