Everything is complicated about using concrete - the discipline and dedication necessary to make consistent batches, understanding exactly how the formwork will be laid, what the timing is for the pours, how you keep it clean and neat to achieve a fine quality.

Annabelle Selldorf

Categorized in : You Discipline Quality Dedication

When you have rules to abide by, does that curtail you as a designer, or set you free? People think of classical architecture visually, but I think the brilliant part of it is actually spatial.

Annabelle Selldorf

doe people thinking

One of the things I've always loved about New York is there is so much precedent for ornament on industrial buildings.

Annabelle Selldorf

ornaments building new-york

I'm inspired by looking at art, by looking at precedent. Looking is what you have to do if you want to make things, so you develop a critical eye.

Annabelle Selldorf

eye want art

When everything is perfectly orderly and understandable, there has to be one thing that puts everything into question.

Annabelle Selldorf

orderly one-thing

I never like things that don't look nice. It's really that simple.

Annabelle Selldorf

nice simple looks

I know I'm old-fashioned, but there's just something about the act of looking at books versus taking in information on a screen, which is so one-dimensional. There's a sense of ownership that you have with books, a physical connection.

Annabelle Selldorf

connections information book

I think when you look at architectural photography it doesn't help to have piles of old clothes lying on the floor. Architectural photography sets up an artifice.

Annabelle Selldorf

photography lying thinking

What I do isn't radical. It's just distinct in small ways.

Annabelle Selldorf

radical way

I remember, as a young architect, people always talked about I. M. Pei's concrete. He had a particular specification no one else knew.

Annabelle Selldorf

architect remember people

I'm not so interested in technology for technology's sake. I don't need incredibly sophisticated climate-control systems. And I'm absolutely amazed at the time people spend exchanging messages; I don't have a lot of time left over for those things.

Annabelle Selldorf

technology messages people

All clients think that they are architects.

Annabelle Selldorf

architect clients thinking

To me, the nicest luxury would be to have a room where I could keep all my books in one place - and have space for more.

Annabelle Selldorf

luxury space book

So much of what makes a room great is how you enter and circulate through it, how it addresses the body.

Annabelle Selldorf

addresses body rooms

I make spaces that are calm rather than confrontational. I seek a certain kind of logic that allows you to move in space and perceive it as beautiful and rational. Clarity is a worthwhile quality.

Annabelle Selldorf

space beautiful moving

Architecture is about aging well, about precision and authenticity. There is much more to the success of a building than what you can see. Im not suggesting that gestural architecture is always superficial, but solid reasoning has its place.

Annabelle Selldorf

aging authenticity architecture

I was brought up to reuse things.

Annabelle Selldorf

reuse

The secret of good architecture is having more than meets the eye.

Annabelle Selldorf

architecture eye secret

There's no architect who doesn't want to build a library - and I am no different. With so much scrutiny now attached to reading - because of technology and how we approach it as a social activity - that is a very exciting area in architecture.

Annabelle Selldorf

library technology reading

Tension is an interesting quality - and architecture must have it. There should be elements of the inexplicable, the mysterious, and the poetic in something that is perfectly rational.

Annabelle Selldorf

elements quality interesting

There isn't any one material that's mine. It all depends on the context. For example, I did a house that had the most exquisite marble applications. That sounds ostentatious, but it wasn't, given the context. The color white I subscribe to extensively. I love thinking about color, but I often go with white.

Annabelle Selldorf

color white love thinking