Hamilton Spectator

Raymond Moriyama

Internationally renowned architect Dr. Raymond Moriyama has never settled for mediocrity. He spent part of his childhood in Westdale, growing up in poverty after his Japanese-Canadian family lost everything in Second World War internment camps. He recently built the Canadian War Museum. Here, the 77-year-old talks about his philosophy on design, humanity and the gift his father gave him that he still thinks about. I don't have any. In our case, we start by listening. Listening to whoever will talk to us. On the war museum ... what we were pushing was imagination, passion, commitment and listening ... We have an acronym in our office called the three Ls. The first L is listen, and learn from listening, and then the third L is for taking leadership in design. We don't go in with a preconception.