I loathe categorization. I cherish my independence, and I treasure chivalry. I live just fine with ambiguity, and I welcome a good quarrel about all things designed or grown - except for when men misnomer 'confident' with 'poised' and 'passionate' with 'feisty.' I work hard.

When I came to MIT, there were four rubrics: science, art, design, and technology. And as you entered your degree, whether it was a master's or a Ph.D., if you were a citizen in one domain, you were a traveler in the other.

Prior to the Industrial Revolution, hand-production methods were abundant. Craft defined everything. The craftsman had an almost phenomenological knowledge of materials and intuited how to vary their properties according to their structural and environmental characteristics.

In nature, there is no separation between design, engineering, and fabrication; the bone does it all.

Because glass is at once structural and transparent, it is relatively easy to consider the integration of structural and environmental building performance within a single integrated skin.

I don't separate architecture, design, or culture. What's more important is a language of creativity that carries meaning.

A great dream of mine would be to run a design studio full of scientists who think about science as creatively as if they were doing art.