:00:09. > :00:20.What difference can the design of a building make? Can architecture
:00:21. > :00:25.inspired people to think differently or perhaps even behave differently?
:00:26. > :00:29.My guest is one of the most sought after architects in the world
:00:30. > :00:35.today. Amongst his many buildings, the Nobel Peace Center in Oslo, the
:00:36. > :00:41.business school, shopping centres in Beirut and Lagos, the Children's
:00:42. > :00:45.Hospital, housing project. And about to open his biggest project yet. The
:00:46. > :00:52.national museum of African-American history and culture sitting right on
:00:53. > :00:55.the national mall in Washington. Has he got it right? What the test of a
:00:56. > :01:19.new building? Given the history of this project,
:01:20. > :01:24.the National Museum of African American History
:01:25. > :01:26.and Culture, and its location, is it the biggest professional
:01:27. > :01:32.challenge you have faced? It's been an eight-year journey
:01:33. > :01:37.this year so it's been the biggest Eight years for you
:01:38. > :01:42.but the first time this museum was Absolutely,
:01:43. > :01:45.it's been a long time coming. The director of the museum,
:01:46. > :01:46.Lonnie Bunch, said no matter what you've done
:01:47. > :01:50.and what you do, this will be the Highly likely.
:01:51. > :02:00.I can't question that. Here we are a few months from its
:02:01. > :02:04.opening, it's almost complete now. It's almost complete,
:02:05. > :02:07.it opens in September this year. Are you where you want to be,
:02:08. > :02:10.are you in a position where you think, this is what I envisaged,
:02:11. > :02:17.this is what I wanted to do? When I go to Washington now,
:02:18. > :02:22.the site's been opened and the city can see it, the gardens have been
:02:23. > :02:25.planted, apart from the snow, that has taken them down, but the site
:02:26. > :02:29.has been planted, it is there, you can see the presence
:02:30. > :02:31.and the relationships we worked on for many months
:02:32. > :02:34.and years suddenly makes sense. When do you decide
:02:35. > :02:43.if it's been a success? When people walk in
:02:44. > :02:46.and start using it the way we think If that happens and
:02:47. > :02:52.if they make new discoveries that add to the qualities we imagined
:02:53. > :02:55.then we know it's a success. And in terms of its reception,
:02:56. > :03:01.when the reviews come in We can't do anything about reviews,
:03:02. > :03:08.some people will love it and some It's
:03:09. > :03:16.a building that's not background. It's really something that makes
:03:17. > :03:18.a statement In the world that we live in where
:03:19. > :03:30.issues about how our cities are made up of different diversities and
:03:31. > :03:33.groups from different ethnicities, this project goes straight to that
:03:34. > :03:36.sort of discussion because it talks about the nature of America
:03:37. > :03:38.and how its communities are brought And it talks about a very important
:03:39. > :03:43.community who were used for commerce to make America who feel they have
:03:44. > :03:47.been sidelined and who now have It is on the Mall surrounded
:03:48. > :03:51.by neoclassical buildings. Which is why Robert Stern, Dean
:03:52. > :03:54.at Yale of School of Architecture, said, "It doesn't seem to have
:03:55. > :03:57.a strong relationship to them. "Some people would say that's good
:03:58. > :04:00.but I would say maybe that's not I actually admire him because I
:04:01. > :04:07.think he's a great thinker. What he's not realising is we're not
:04:08. > :04:09.making We didn't want to mimic
:04:10. > :04:17.the neoclassical architecture that was around but we wanted to take
:04:18. > :04:20.clues from it. We are making a classical building,
:04:21. > :04:22.I would argue. It has symmetrical facades, it is
:04:23. > :04:29.four sides that are symmetrical, It refers to the Washington
:04:30. > :04:32.monument, there's an obelisk that refers to Egyptian architecture,
:04:33. > :04:34.not just Greek architecture, It's unpacking that Washington is
:04:35. > :04:39.much more compex than the Greek neoclassical language, something
:04:40. > :04:42.that embraces and goes back to the beginnings of the origins
:04:43. > :04:44.of architecture in terms of Egypt's history and its influence
:04:45. > :04:46.on what becomes European, classical architecture, but it talks
:04:47. > :04:48.about modern architecture A black person,
:04:49. > :05:01.a black American going up to that What does it make them feel
:05:02. > :05:04.and think? I think knowing that the building
:05:05. > :05:09.is there makes them feel they are very much part of this nation, they
:05:10. > :05:11.are very much You could put anything there
:05:12. > :05:16.and say that. Absolutely.
:05:17. > :05:19.What is different? When you were designing it,
:05:20. > :05:22.what is it that does these things Architecture sadly is silent,
:05:23. > :05:29.it relies on people engaging When the first person saw
:05:30. > :05:34.a classical building they didn't think it was a temple,
:05:35. > :05:38.they were told it was a temple, they This building has
:05:39. > :05:41.an incredibly powerful story. It talks about the story
:05:42. > :05:44.of the African-American community and the references being made
:05:45. > :05:46.in terms of the form. It's not
:05:47. > :05:48.an arbitrary functional form. It's a functional device
:05:49. > :05:49.on the building, it's a corona which creates
:05:50. > :05:52.the first environmentaly leads building on the Washington Mall,
:05:53. > :05:55.so a highly sustainable building. But it uses at the geometry
:05:56. > :05:58.of an African heritage, the Yoruba heritage,
:05:59. > :06:00.which was basically to look at the sculpture of the shrine houses
:06:01. > :06:03.of the Yoruba, which is where... In that part of West Africa,
:06:04. > :06:06.a lot of the African-American community came
:06:07. > :06:08.from that we now know, using DNA tracking, we know that a large part
:06:09. > :06:11.of that community came from that. I wanted to make a slightly romantic
:06:12. > :06:15.reference to the long history of this community, not just the
:06:16. > :06:17.American history but to say they came from Africa, they crossed the
:06:18. > :06:21.ocean, they came to America, but the details of the building aren't
:06:22. > :06:30.specifically African, its hybrid. The details are ones that look
:06:31. > :06:33.at the work of the African-American slaves, the ironwork of Charleston,
:06:34. > :06:34.Louisiana, taking the classical language and
:06:35. > :06:41.working with it and I love that. You designed this
:06:42. > :06:44.but you are not American. Even the director
:06:45. > :06:49.of the museum acknowledged a lot of people felt it had to be designed
:06:50. > :06:53.by a black person but specifically What's been the reaction to the fact
:06:54. > :06:57.that here you are, born in Tanzania, I applaud the jury
:06:58. > :07:05.for taking me because I think the African-American story is really
:07:06. > :07:13.a story of black modernity. If you really is
:07:14. > :07:16.an explosion where black culture is embedded deep in white culture,
:07:17. > :07:18.but then has to develop really fast in the 20th century, in the 19th
:07:19. > :07:26.century to have its own identity. But some people will say, look,
:07:27. > :07:28.what about using an American? After all, isn't it a continuing
:07:29. > :07:33.part of the problem of exclusion? I would say that it is really
:07:34. > :07:36.a shame that at this stage, even at that stage eight years ago I was
:07:37. > :07:40.probably one of the few prominent architects of colour that had
:07:41. > :07:42.actually risen through the ranks and won competitions
:07:43. > :07:44.and not just been handed out work I had won international competitions
:07:45. > :07:53.against the field and had built my reputation and
:07:54. > :07:56.built up my name through my work. What they found was I had risen to
:07:57. > :08:02.a point where I could demonstrate the capacity to do that work,
:08:03. > :08:05.to do such a project of such complexity, and, you know, I would
:08:06. > :08:08.not have any sense of, sort of, I think in architecture,
:08:09. > :08:22.it's very difficult to say a person from the ethnic country,
:08:23. > :08:25.or the national country, has to be Looking at St Petersburg,
:08:26. > :08:31.it was built by Italians. The world is much more complicated
:08:32. > :08:34.than national boundaries. Let's look at something right
:08:35. > :08:37.in the centre in Paris, Built by of course by
:08:38. > :08:48.Richard Rogers. He said of that, it's a very
:08:49. > :08:51.powerful moment when he built something of such huge significance,
:08:52. > :08:53.which this is to America. It does crazy things to your career
:08:54. > :08:56.where you kind of mushroom and it creates complexities, and you
:08:57. > :09:00.must be so aware of that now. Yes, it conflates
:09:01. > :09:03.and expands things, it allows you to Who would have thought I would
:09:04. > :09:11.have been here talking to you? At the same time it is also
:09:12. > :09:14.a tough subject because it is when architecture really gets
:09:15. > :09:16.into the public psyche the way normal architecture within
:09:17. > :09:19.libraries and schools don't come up You're dealing with political issues
:09:20. > :09:27.suddenly, and I'm talking about politics with
:09:28. > :09:30.you when I'm really an architect. Let's talk about politics
:09:31. > :09:31.and library, because you are one of the front
:09:32. > :09:38.runners for one of Barack Obama's. I am very lucky to be
:09:39. > :09:41.in the shortlist The presidential library
:09:42. > :09:44.to be built in Chicago. I think the shortlist said it
:09:45. > :09:49.doesn't have to be an American, it recognises that architecture is
:09:50. > :09:52.an international universal language of our civilisation
:09:53. > :09:54.and humanity and there are three That is a big statement
:09:55. > :09:58.about their intent, that anyone can You talk about the new language
:09:59. > :10:02.we need in public buildings. People typically look back when
:10:03. > :10:05.they should be looking forward? I don't mind looking back,
:10:06. > :10:07.I think that it's important But architecture has for
:10:08. > :10:17.so long been embedded in codes in the way we want to create
:10:18. > :10:20.exclusions or separations. I think we are in a century where we
:10:21. > :10:23.have finally begun to become very aware of our planet
:10:24. > :10:26.and our ralationship to it, and I think it makes us responsible
:10:27. > :10:37.stewards to make things on the planet which have agency
:10:38. > :10:40.in terms of understanding exactly where they are, their geography and
:10:41. > :10:43.context, but also acknowledging the I mean their democratic ideals,
:10:44. > :10:56.their beliefs about what they think I think architecture can harness
:10:57. > :10:59.those lessons and make buildings which actually
:11:00. > :11:03.exemplify and embody those things. A complete contrast,
:11:04. > :11:05.let's go to Rwanda, you are building a children's
:11:06. > :11:07.hospital just south of Kigali. A rather different project, and
:11:08. > :11:10.the first of its kind in Africa. Cancer is a major problem
:11:11. > :11:19.of the 20th and now 21st-century. I love what President Obama said
:11:20. > :11:22.in his State of the Union address, let's do a moonshot to try
:11:23. > :11:26.and get rid of cancer, But here we are on the continent
:11:27. > :11:33.of Africa and if you need specialist care
:11:34. > :11:37.for children then you have to go to If you don't have funds for that,
:11:38. > :11:41.how do you do it? It is part US and also African
:11:42. > :11:46.investment, but it's a global investment that recognises this is
:11:47. > :11:48.important and it needs to happen. The site that has been chosen is
:11:49. > :11:52.Rwanda because it is centrally located in terms of the continent's
:11:53. > :11:54.geography, it has enough It's also not just a hospital,
:11:55. > :12:01.it is a training centre for other doctors in the region to
:12:02. > :12:05.use it as a place to get expertise. You approach a design like that
:12:06. > :12:08.and you think differently in terms of everything,
:12:09. > :12:13.not least what you can afford. In Rwanda, we're thinking here's
:12:14. > :12:18.an architecture that needs to It's right in the heart of the
:12:19. > :12:23.tropical forest of Africa, the dense It can't look
:12:24. > :12:35.like any hospital anywhere else. It's talking about cancer care,
:12:36. > :12:38.so it has to have inspiration. Some of the studies
:12:39. > :12:41.about cancer care now is people actually have to be uplifted
:12:42. > :12:44.and some of the great projects that have looked at this talk about
:12:45. > :12:47.connecting people back to nature. This idea of reconnecting people
:12:48. > :12:49.back to the environment but also making an environmental
:12:50. > :12:51.response that shields and shades, doesn't create an alien object, also
:12:52. > :12:55.some of the language I want to work The geometry you see on the skin of
:12:56. > :13:00.the building and the way that it is organised is based on understanding
:13:01. > :13:02.Rwandan vernacular architecture, the patterns women make as geometries to
:13:03. > :13:05.adorn their buildings. We've taken that not just to make
:13:06. > :13:08.patterns, but we wanted to use computer technology to turn them
:13:09. > :13:10.into shading devices Are you suggesting that the
:13:11. > :13:24.building is part of the treatment? People can get better if they are
:13:25. > :13:28.in a good building? The quality of the built environment
:13:29. > :13:32.can inspire a person to feel better about themselves, which encourages
:13:33. > :13:37.their body to feel better. It's how the building
:13:38. > :13:43.makes you feels about... It's not so much about style, it's
:13:44. > :13:47.not so much about aesthetics, is it tastefully done or not, is there
:13:48. > :13:50.a certain integrity that makes you feel comfortable and gives you a
:13:51. > :13:53.sense of well-being and comfort, and an ability to be inspired
:13:54. > :13:56.by the environment. In the end, architecture is a series
:13:57. > :13:58.of environments to inspire us I In a sense what you are trying to
:13:59. > :14:13.do with the museum in Washington It is almost
:14:14. > :14:17.an intellectual exercise. There has been a great deal of
:14:18. > :14:27.focus, not least by David Cameron, a couple of weeks ago suggesting he
:14:28. > :14:30.wants to transform 100 housing estates across the country, and he
:14:31. > :14:33.talks about a warm family home, you open the door and you are confronted
:14:34. > :14:45.by criminals and drug dealers. These places design
:14:46. > :14:50.in crime rather than out. It is not
:14:51. > :14:59.the concrete creating criminals. Many wealthy people live
:15:00. > :15:00.in concrete buildings. Japan has more concrete buildings
:15:01. > :15:05.than anywhere else and is part It is a question of investment
:15:06. > :15:13.and support. With housing, post-war architects
:15:14. > :15:16.had to build housing quickly because we had a serious war that
:15:17. > :15:19.everyone had come through, no We didn't learn from the lessons
:15:20. > :15:28.of the past and build in networks and infrastructure
:15:29. > :15:34.supporting dense communities. You can't have a tower in a field
:15:35. > :15:37.of grass with no support, no shops, You cannot build these buildings
:15:38. > :15:43.without looking after them. If he goes ahead with this,
:15:44. > :15:48.does this regeneration, that's not If you look at Sheffield,
:15:49. > :15:55.Parkhill Estate, which is very famous, which everyone thought was
:15:56. > :15:58.a bunker, they have refurbished it, very elegant, and it is one of the
:15:59. > :16:04.most desirable places in Sheffield. When your fridge is out of date,
:16:05. > :16:11.you don't keep it because... They say that the riots in 2011,
:16:12. > :16:23.three quarters of those lived It is about making them
:16:24. > :16:36.sustainable and creating this Even the Joseph Rowntree Foundation
:16:37. > :16:46.charity says it is true that poor You would say to keep the buildings,
:16:47. > :17:00.give them maintenance and care but you are putting something
:17:01. > :17:02.alongside them? Put in infrastructure to
:17:03. > :17:11.support the community. Put in a doctors surgery,
:17:12. > :17:13.infrastructure to support These are lots of people living
:17:14. > :17:16.in singular types of buildings. We have so many strategies
:17:17. > :17:24.for how to do it. What has happened is we have left
:17:25. > :17:30.these communities What would a David Adjaye redesigned
:17:31. > :17:35.housing estate do for crime How far can you claim to make
:17:36. > :17:46.a difference? I think that people
:17:47. > :17:50.very much reflect... There's a thesis which says that
:17:51. > :17:52.if your environment feels poor and downtrodden,
:17:53. > :17:54.you will feel aggressive If your environment is well invested
:17:55. > :18:02.in and looks as if it supports communities, different age groups
:18:03. > :18:05.and communities, it is harder to There are many examples to
:18:06. > :18:13.prove that is the case. Someone approaches you
:18:14. > :18:16.and you say what? Give me this money
:18:17. > :18:21.and I can do it...? Make the analysis of these estates,
:18:22. > :18:23.analyse them, Sometimes materials invented
:18:24. > :18:28.in the 50s are no longer healthy. We do things we think are right
:18:29. > :18:36.at the time. With housing estates it is critical
:18:37. > :18:41.to support them with the right kind of community support
:18:42. > :18:44.so that they are places for all age groups, for all kinds
:18:45. > :18:47.of diversity and walks of life. Some of them are
:18:48. > :18:55.but they become enclaves. If you got your hands on it it could
:18:56. > :19:02.still end up being a brutal high-rise tower but because of what
:19:03. > :19:07.else you add to it you change it? Yes, some materials will be
:19:08. > :19:17.worn out and you redo those. He is absolutely right that there is
:19:18. > :19:24.crime in these places but the answer is not to bulldoze the architecture,
:19:25. > :19:27.the answer is to analyse that architecture and see what support is
:19:28. > :19:31.needed and I say that because I don't think we should trash
:19:32. > :19:37.buildings and take them down I think we should analyse things,
:19:38. > :19:42.look at the evidence and see how we Listening to you,
:19:43. > :19:48.I am reminded of one of your critics who described you as allowing your
:19:49. > :19:53.eloquence to run away with you. The criticism has been made
:19:54. > :19:57.of the buildings as well. Rowan Moore, critic at the Observer,
:19:58. > :20:00.has said there is a tendency for the story of the design to
:20:01. > :20:03.outrun the realisation. He was speaking about
:20:04. > :20:05.Whitechapel Library. What we were doing
:20:06. > :20:12.when we were looking at the library was to encourage as many people
:20:13. > :20:16.as we could to go to the library. When we built it,
:20:17. > :20:19.we found a year later that there People did not know where
:20:20. > :20:27.the entrance was. The escalator was shut down
:20:28. > :20:31.and people said, With the analysis
:20:32. > :20:44.of the conversation it was all about It was sad for me
:20:45. > :20:50.for him to do that because he knows that community and that it is one of
:20:51. > :20:54.the most used libraries in London. You were involved in a project
:20:55. > :20:57.in New York , Sugar Hill, which was described variously
:20:58. > :21:04.as two dark grey blocks. The Guardian called it
:21:05. > :21:10.a blocky concrete citadel. New York magazine called it grim,
:21:11. > :21:14.and an arty fortress. I think critics are absolutely
:21:15. > :21:22.allowed to say what they want and I think the idea of architecture is
:21:23. > :21:25.not to make everyone happy, They want to interrogate
:21:26. > :21:30.and check things, If you go to the building
:21:31. > :21:41.and ask them what they love and hate about it, no one says it is
:21:42. > :21:45.the colour that is a problem. The apartments are designed with
:21:46. > :21:51.bamboo floors, environmental systems, they have a creche for
:21:52. > :21:54.145 kids, they have an urban farm. I am looking
:21:55. > :22:05.at how people are using things, and what are the patterns and to
:22:06. > :22:08.see where we have made mistakes. I am very interested
:22:09. > :22:10.in the afterlife of buildings, I don't just like to build
:22:11. > :22:13.buildings and walk away. What do you hope to hear
:22:14. > :22:15.when you eavesdrop on passers-by? The happiness and joy of being
:22:16. > :22:19.in the environment it has created. That it is contributing to
:22:20. > :22:23.the betterment of life. You are
:22:24. > :22:24.in an extraordinary position. You have commissions
:22:25. > :22:27.from all over the world. You are influencing public life,
:22:28. > :22:31.effectively. And yet the year that you were asked
:22:32. > :22:34.to do the Smithsonian Museum in Washington was the year
:22:35. > :22:38.your company nearly went under. I was trained as an architect,
:22:39. > :22:47.not a businessman. I have had to learn the business
:22:48. > :22:50.of running 100 people my own way. You could not be
:22:51. > :23:01.in that situation again? I think we could put in all
:23:02. > :23:04.of the kind of infrastructure that would help us not to get
:23:05. > :23:06.into that situation naively. I got into that situation naively
:23:07. > :23:10.because I won a lot of competitions and I started to do them without
:23:11. > :23:15.thinking continuation of business. Someone comes to you
:23:16. > :23:19.and says I want you to build one I would not be interested
:23:20. > :23:24.if it was about aesthetics. If it was about understanding
:23:25. > :23:33.density and contributing to how it can be exemplar and how to
:23:34. > :23:36.use energy efficiently, then yes. I am not interested in it
:23:37. > :23:39.as a brooch or a badge. There is a fashion
:23:40. > :23:41.for very high rise. A lot of people link it to
:23:42. > :23:44.the egos of the architect. There are a lot of architects who
:23:45. > :23:48.love doing that but it is not what I I'm interested in architecture
:23:49. > :23:52.that is contributing to the subject, Cities will grow exponentially -
:23:53. > :23:58.more than 50% of the world live in cities and it will grow even more
:23:59. > :24:01.in 15 years. There will be 41 mega cities
:24:02. > :24:04.around the world with over 10 It won't be
:24:05. > :24:09.about wonderful countryside villas. It will be density
:24:10. > :24:12.and infrastructure and that is the issue to focus on and that is
:24:13. > :24:15.what inspires me as an architect. David Adjaye,
:24:16. > :24:20.thank you for coming on HARDtalk.