Interviewed in Madrid, May 23rd 2008

ORIS: Alberto Campo Baeza’s definition of architecture is that the history of architecture is the history of built ideas. Your words were: the architectural idea has no form. Do you see an opposition between these ideas?

Mansilla+Tuñón: Alberto refers to the aim of architecture, so I don’t see a contradiction. The process of architecture is a process of trying to transform ideas into forms, but in our opinion, the starting point is not necessarily a form. We mean that the freedom of giving form to an idea is accomplished by starting off with an abstract idea detached from the form. We like to think of architectural ideas as systems of rules while still maintaining the freedom to develop the size and connections among things until the end, and not to be attached to a form. But in the end, it is all about transforming ideas into things.