I had the pleasure in June 2010 to guide Professor Charles Matz, from the New York Institute of Technology and some students around Egypt for their Summer Abroad Program.
A blog regarding this project can be found here: https://egyptexpedition.blogspot.com/
At the end of the program, Mr Matz wanted me to write some reflections for an introduction to the report that was prepared for the project. I have reproduced below the text I sent him:
Architecture is one of the oldest human art forms. It has been passed down through the centuries and developed through human endeavour to establish a harmonious relationship between man and place. As long as humans have been on earth, we have constructed buildings for shelter at the most rudimentary level, but beyond that, designing any building is a human expression of the emotions, principles and values inside the architect that communicate with his cultural and environmental location. It is as powerful as any other form of art, such as a painted masterpiece, a harmonious symphony, or a moving poem.
All of the great constructions that survive all over the world, at Karnak, Giza, Rome, Istanbul, Paris, Bombay, Agra and elsewhere, survived the challenges of all the natural forces which sought to destroy them, because they were made with love. They emerged into the universe carrying the waves of the emotions and the poems in the hearts of their architects, communicating the love stories between the architects and the people for whom these constructions were made. The names of the great builders, the great architects, from Senenmut and Imhotep to Hassan Fathy, Ahmed Lahauri and others, still remain because all of them strove to re-create the beauty they saw in nature, and because they let nature write itself into the design and construction of their buildings.
Future architects and designers, when you hold your pencil ready to draw your designs, remember that you hold a musical instrument in your hand, which plays the songs of your heart. Please be sure to remember that all people will listen to your songs, so compose and play your tunes with love, so that they remain eternally on the walls of time, singing your story, and saying your name to the people who see your buildings.
Remember that just as you are influenced by the people and places that you design your buildings for, so too, the spirit of the people who live and work and shelter in your buildings will be influenced by the values of goodness and beauty that you have instilled in your designs. This influence, which comes from our most basic need for shelter, is more powerful than any other art form in influencing our spirits, because it so integral to our daily lives.
So raise your pencils, design and find more harmony between buildings and the environment, transform the ugliness of this world into beauty, and increase the feelings of familiarity and comfort in the relationships between people and the places in which they live,so that they in turn, can continue to spread the good that always remains.