Speaking to The Guardian, David Chipperfield has stated that he regards the hold of private investment over new architecture in London as an "absolutely terrible" means of building a city. He argues that Berlin - where he spends considerable amounts of time and runs a large office - "is a much more reflective society than ours" because the UK has sunk into "a success-based culture."
[In Berlin] there is still an idea of the public realm. We have given that up in London. We have declared the public realm dead; the question is how to get stuff out of the private sector. We are unbelievably sophisticated at that.
He believes that there is more discussion in Germany "about what things mean," using his decade-long reconstruction of the Neues Museum as a key example. His office is set to restore and repair the iconic Neue Nationalgalerie (1968), the last building completed by Mies van der Rohe. According to Chipperfield, there has already been a "fascinating discussion within the German system between the cultural meaning and the technical performance of the building."
Read about Chipperfield's opinions on UK and European politics in relation to cities here.
