Peter Zumthor (born 26 April 1943) is a Swiss architect and winner of the 2009 Pritzker Prize and 2013 RIBA Royal Gold Medal. Read full biography of Peter Zumthor →
The first 10 years of my professional life had only to do with running away from my father. He was a wonderful cabinet-maker, and me being the eldest... →
Designing is a matter of concentration. You go deep into what you want to do. It's about intensive research, really. The concentration is warm... →
You feel a certain way in a glass or concrete or limestone building. It has an effect on your skin - the same with plywood or veneer, or solid... →
Every time I imagine a garden in an architectural setting, it turns into a magical place. I think of gardens I have seen, that I believe I have seen... →
I work a little bit like a sculptor. When I start, my first idea for a building is with the material. I believe architecture is about that. It's... →
I am convinced that a good building must be capable of absorbing the traces of human life and taking on a specific richness... I think of the patina... →
The bottom line may be that my inventing buildings is, indeed, a very private kind of activity. But it's done to be shared. It is comforting and... →
When I concentrate on a specific site or place for which I am going to design a building, I try to plumb its depths, its form, its history and its... →
I think space, architectural space, is my thing. It's not about facade, elevation, making image, making money. My passion is creating space.
Architecture is exposed to life. If its body is sensitive enough, it can assume a quality that bears witness to past life.
My buildings should have an emotional core - a space which, in itself, has an emotional nice feeling.
If you're lucky, and a building succeeds, the real product has many more dimensions than you can ever imagine. You have the sun, the light, the... →
If you look at the Earth without architecture, it's sometimes a little bit unpleasant. So there is this basic human need to do shelter in the... →
Peter Zumthor (born 26 April 1943) is a Swiss architect and winner of the 2009 Pritzker Prize and 2013 RIBA Royal Gold Medal.