Minoru Yamasaki Quotations

The World Trade Center is a living symbol of man's dedication to world peace... a representation of man's belief in humanity, his need for individual dignity, his beliefs in the cooperation of men, and, through cooperation, his ability to find greatness.

And a building must be like a human being. It must have a wholeness about it, something that is very important.

And sometimes I'm criticized. But I think that if those who criticize us will look at the reason why the shape is this, well then, I think that they would not object so strenuously.

If you have white walls, human beings look better in a room than if you have red walls.

And I feel that we in our society should not be held by any such myth; that we should do everything we can to gain a delight and joy in our society with all the available parts of the palette.

The Wayne Education Building was the first classroom building that we have done on the Wayne campus.

We build buildings which are terribly restless. And buildings don't go anywhere. They shouldn't be restless.

I feel this is very important for us to have serene buildings because our civilization is chaotic as it is, you see; our whole machine age has brought about a chaos that has to be somehow counterbalanced, I think.

If you look at the buildings, you'll find that one part looks as if it was designed by one man, and you go around and look at another facade and it looks as if it was designed by another man, you see.

So what we have tried to do in our later buildings is to try to be completely consistent, as a painter is consistent or as a sculptor is consistent. Architecture also must be very consistent.

Because, if we understand how a building is to be produced and we find a way that it can be more simply produced, then obviously we are contributing to building better buildings more easily.

But now I know that it is very important that all buildings should be consistent, that this is the quality of the Gothic cathedral, for instance, that we like.

And I think that the environment is one very strong way to counterbalance the chaotic nature of our life.

In other words, each piece of the building must look as though it was designed for that particular building.

In other words, I have no truck for anyone who goes out and does an eclectic building.

And I like the idea of change. Because I don't see why we should hang a painting on the wall and then just not think of it anymore because it's there like a piece of furniture.

Being the gateway to a large city, St. Louis, I had felt from the very beginning that somehow this building should symbolize this sense of being a gateway.

If you examine this, I think that you will find that it's the mechanics of Japanese architecture that have been thought of as the direct influence upon our architecture.

I have been criticized rather strenuously by painters and sculptors for not incorporating their work in our buildings.

The view outside was much more important than the exhibits.

I can't do everything obviously although sometimes I know that all of us wish that we could

I believe that we must understand the economy of the situation.

Let's talk about the Gas Company because this is my favorite job.

I want to do very useful buildings and I would like to find a method of producing these buildings through our technology because I think that this is the only way that we will gain wonderful environment easily in the future.

In this tour around the world I was not interested in contemporary buildings because I had seen contemporary buildings actually until they came out of my ears in a sense.

So I test all the buildings that I do by asking myself whether this building was possible, could have been built 50 years ago or a hundred years ago.

The interesting thing about Oberlin College as it differs from other more urban schools or universities is that it is a walking campus.

But I don't see why we have to take a central hall, for instance, and use in it a sculpture or painting. I think it detracts, somehow.

However, India is a democracy and they deeply believe in democracy and we feel that it would not be good to overwhelm them with propaganda.

Japanese architecture is very much copied in this country and in Europe.

I didn't want to lose the human scale.

The purpose of architecture is to create an atmosphere in which man can live, work, and enjoy.

And exciting buildings are fine periodically.

I feel this way about it. World trade means world peace and consequently the World Trade Center buildings in New York ... had a bigger purpose than just to provide room for tenants. The World Trade Center is a living symbol of man's dedication to world peace ... beyond the compelling need to make this a monument to world peace, the World Trade Center should, because of its importance, become a representation of man's belief in humanity, his need for individual dignity, his beliefs in the cooperation of men, and through cooperation, his ability to find greatness.