On the Oriental Masonic Gardens, New Haven, CT

"In New Haven, in the 60s, I designed some housing using trailers. I had the acquiescence of Mayor Lee, a remarkable mayor indeed. The whole notion of making a project for about 150 people using trailers was difficult to persuade anybody to do. I suppose it was a mistake; it was eventually demolished. People hated it. First of all it leaked, which is a very good reason to hate something, but I think it was much more complicated than that. Psychologically, the good folk who inhabited these dwellings thought that they were beneath them. In other words, the deviation of the dwelling was not something to their liking. I thought, and I suppose the mayor thought, that trailers were perfectly good enough for them. But I should say, in defense of what we built, that it was a pocket court plan and that it provided a separate outside space for each family. There were two stories, with a core at the center. I am very tenacious about certain things, and in the long run it seems to me that with the correcting of mistakes one can make something much more successful."

Remarks included in the posthumous article "Rethinking Designs in the 60s," Perspecta, 1998.