On the Characteristic and Beliefs of the Architect

4. The idea of cultivation is important to understanding the actions of architects. The analogy to the gardener is appropriate. Architecture is the most obvious flower of a society's culture. It evolves or revolves like the wheat in the field. It is in a process of continual reevaluation. It is continually cross-bred to improve the strain. Some flatter one crop more than another. At its best it will comprise the exotic flowers that entertain and puzzle; the constants of beauty and form like the rose; the pragmatic and the utilitarian; and as in nature, a host of undifferentiated growth, whose character comes from the representation of mass, like the forest or the meadow. And there will be times of drought and disease. 5. There are sexual dimensions to the