I’m often asked what inspired me to be an architect? I think I finally remembered when it happened.

I must have been twelve years old when I visited a friend’s house in Puerto Rico and their home was being remodeled. It was fascinating. Things were gone, others had appeared and a transformation had begun. I was moved and inspired in that moment when a new possibility opened up to me: to effect change in the physical world through design. Years later, I decided to become an architect and many years after that I am still in love with the art of construction.

A drawing by Escher-a master in the art of possibilities

There are other moments in life that moved, touched and inspired me, and forever altered my relationship to the physical world. What they all have in common is being participant to unexpected wonders unfolding before my eyes. I’ll list a few.

Opera

My love affair with the Opera began the day I was taken to see Carmen when I was thirteen. Years later, I was at the Opera in Verona and suddenly the Arena lit up with 20,000 candles at the beginning of a production of Turandot. Many years after that, the curtain went up at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City to reveal the magnificence of the set of a different production of Turandot.

Dusk at the Arena Di Verona-the candle ceremony. Magic.

Art

I was speechless when I saw Picasso’s Guernica when it was still at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1979: bitter pain was captured on canvas in a work of immense power and beauty. In 1982, while the Louvre was in the midst of major renovations, entire sections of the museum were closed, I was determined to find the Ancient Greek statue of the winged Victory of Samothrace and there she was, in a dark, dusty hall waiting in perfect equilibrium to descend again on the prow of a battle ship.

This is one of the most powerful expressions of protest I’ve experienced. Technically, it’s silent.

I had to maneuver through the Louvre until I found this statue. I was determined to be moved, touched and inspired. I was not disappointed.

Architecture

As I walked into the Cathedral at Chartres, France the organist struck a chord that made me stop in my tracks. And then there was the time when I experienced architecture and nature become interchangeable at Gaudi’s Parc Güell in Barcelona. I felt like Jonas being swallowed by the whale when I entered Gehry’s Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao only to be thrust into the atrium of the museum moments later.

As it is intended, the architecture of Chartes is uplifting.

One of the most delightful places I’ve visited.

I was not ready for the power of this building. Whoa!

Nature

At Flamingo Beach in the island of Culebra, Puerto Rico, I felt as one with the calm serenity of nature in a place that still feels untouched by man. By contrast, the monumentality of Yellowstone National Park made me seem the size of a small point on a piece of paper.*

An earthly paradise.

To say it’s monumental is an understatement.

*To be continued.