Architect Thom Mayne is principal of Santa Monica-based Morphosis and a founder of the Southern California Institute of Architecture. Before participating in a panel on how architects shape cities, he talked in the Zócalo green room about his love of steak tartare, his hatred of neckties, and the three traffic tickets he got when he abandoned his hot rod for a more sensible Fiat.
What does it take to get you out on a dance floor?
That’s easy. It’s going to be an R & B-ish rock-and-roll for sure.
What’s the last great book you read?
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. It was amazing. You know what’s really amazing about that book? [Jonathan Safran Foer] was 26 years old when he wrote it.
What salad dressing best describes you?
That is one of the weirdest questions I’ve ever heard. If I was a salad dressing—damn. I guess it would have to be something sweet and sourish, something that had some conflicting nature to it, and something with some density and complexity. And some surprise element—some kick somewhere. There’d be a touch of cayenne so you’d know something happened.
When and why did you last get a traffic ticket?
Oh I got three in a row. Listen to this one! I went from a hot rod—I bought a Fiat 500 and thought I was going to be a really good citizen! Those little tiny cars? I got three tickets, and all of them were bullshit tickets. I got rid of the car. I’m back to a hot rod.
What advice do you give to aspiring architects?
It’s who you are, and not what you do. It’s completely consuming. It’s probably one of the hardest professions that ever existed, but it is one of the most rewarding—if you have to do it. You only do it if you have to do it—there’s no reason to otherwise. Unless you’re a masochist.
What do you like least about the Internet?
It’s too prescriptive. I’ve been shifting, reading The New York Times on the iPad. I can’t do it. I’m going back to paper. It takes away too much selective freedom.
How do you like your steak?
I don’t eat steak. I eat two slices of steak probably a year. And it’s going to be medium, definitely not red. Although I love steak tartare, figure that out. So I do eat steak, that’s not true. I’ll have steak tartare if I’m in Paris or at Raoul’s in New York.
What’s the ugliest tie you own?
That I’d wear? I wouldn’t wear just about any normal businessman’s tie. I do wear ties when I feel like it, but they’re going to be something interesting. A tie is a symbol.
How do you procrastinate?
I start getting anal and cleaning things. Ordering things. It means I’m worried, and I don’t want to deal with something. And what else do I do to procrastinate? I shift channels, and I start getting involved in some other topic, like most people, versus the topic I’m supposed to be dealing with.
What’s your earliest childhood memory?
You know you don’t have early memories because they’ve been revived—they’re the memories that have been told to you again. I think it was taking a bath in a tub on my grandmother’s farm in Tipton, Indiana. If you’re a kid you don’t even go in the house; it’s a formal family. You get clean in the backyard, and I remember pumping the hand pump, my brother and I. I was probably 4 or 5. Every summer I went to my grandmother’s farm.