“The usual definition of scale is the relationship of the human dimension to the environment. We talk about a building being “in scale” or “out of scale,” which is really nonsense. Most buildings that really count have multiple scales. Buildings need to be understandable in their varying dimensions – sight, sound, smell, relationship to their environment, their spot on the globe, materials, climate, the mode of approaching, modes of movement (i.e., walking, automobile, train, subway, bus, plane), etc. All of this is modified by our cultural memory and the twentieth-century contributions to transportation. The quickly moving vehicle has transformed the possibilities of scale as an architectural tool to help remind us of our humanity. Our modes of transportation will change in unpredictable ways, but the population explosion ensures that “getting there” will be with us for some time, and this changes our understanding of the environment.”
Interview with Peter Blake included in “Paul Rudolph: The Late Work.” 2003.

“Yes, I was fired. But in a sense, my influence and efforts did not change that drastically -- not at first anyway -- because the other architects -- and I have to emphasize that there were many architects involved -- understood that there was a pervading idea, series of ideas, welding the campus into one, and that it needed to be an ongoing effort, so the other architects actually came to my rescue, otherwise it would not have worked.
The then Governor of Massachusetts [John Volpe] felt very strongly that I should resign, so I had no alternative but to do so. This was essentially over questions of cost, but his staff, as I understand it, reported that our buildings were little, if any, more expensive than others the state of Massachusetts was erecting. But the good governor, as I understand it, retorted that it didn't matter really what they cost, they looked expensive, which I thought was a very nice compliment. In any event, too much was at stake, from my viewpoint anyway, and too much had already been planned or designed or considered. It is one thing to put on paper initial ideas, and it is another thing to see that those ideas are developed properly through the labyrinth of integrating the work of many different kinds of engineering, disciplines, modifications of program, considerations of costs, learning from earlier work on a large project -- both negative and positive --and correcting or modifying that experience.”
Interview with Lasse Antonsen, 1996

“When working on the Tuskegee Chapel, I suggested a continuous slot of glass around the perimeter just below the roof, so the natural light enters the sanctuary diagonally. The roof is hyperbolic paraboloid in form for acoustic reasons, and the space rises diagonally and escapes through glass. The directions of the movement of space are in opposite but balanced directions, which is largely responsible for the dynamic quality of the space. In addition, there is a varying velocity of the movement of space. The floor is almost level, but the ceiling height above the floor constantly changes, so that the space moves rapidly where the ceiling is high but more slowly where the ceiling is low. All of this must be imagined, so that there is a balance between opposite movements of space and light.”
Interview with Peter Blake included in “Paul Rudolph: The Late Work.” 2003.

“When I first started, I made guest houses because no one would trust me with the main house.”

Interview with John Cook and Heinrich Klotz, 1973

“The second Sarasota High School was a move from clear form, from clear structure, from lineal structural elements defining space, to the organization of planes in space. It depends much more on the space and the handling of light, which really meant planes rather than linear elements, which in turn commenced my investigations into scale… I’m affected by everything I see. I make no bones about it. I haven’t invented anything in my life. For instance, the entrance to the Sarasota High School can be traced directly to Corbusier’s High Court Building in Chandigarh.”

Interview with John Cook and Heinrich Klotz, 1973