Interestingly, the more I consider architecture the less and less it becomes about simply making a beautiful form. Architecture is instead philosophy writ real, a physical expression of the mind, the manifest representation of a stance toward life. The way a thing is made, the materials selected, the program to which they are applied, and yes the final form chosen-- all these decisions require choices, and the choices have values embedded in them. These values are everything to me. Beauty itself can be hollow or fleeting. It is when we choose to say that this thing is beautiful, or when we imbue the quality of beauty in some thing that we make, that the interesting part happens. For it is at these moments when we reveal what is beautiful to us and what it is that we wish to be beautiful. It is when we choose who we are. The richest things we make never come from an empty heart, but are infused with the richness of the life we wish to make.