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Interviewed by Robert Ivy, FAIA
Edited by Andrea Dean

AR: I doubt there are 140 architects who would understand what you’re saying. That may be hyperbole, but I think by training and inclination this isn’t where architects’ heads are.

WM: Right. 

AR: These three issues or interests--high tech, nanotech, and synergetics combined with an underlying ethical framework and concern for the human condition--set you apart. Do you see yourself as having a point of view that differs from others?

WM: No. I think that what I’m talking about is commonsense. I think everybody can understand what I’m talking about.

AR: Do you see yourself as an innovator?

WM: Only because I’m surprised that what I am doing seems to be unique. So it must represent some form of innovation, but to me it seems so obvious. I don’t feel like I’m inventing things. I feel like I’m discovering things that are already there.

AR: If it is as apparent and clear as you’ve described it, are you impatient with colleagues and clients for not getting it quickly enough?

WM: I’m not impatient. I’m very persistent and very optimistic. If I were impatient about these things I would become a maniac.

AR: Let’s broaden it out a little bit here. Al Gore’s made his movie, oil is at $70 a barrel, temperatures have been at record highs, and China recently had the largest t typhoon in 50 years. Has our clientele and the educated public come around?

WM: Any sentient creature would have to recognize that there’s a sea change coming. There’s a huge human opportunity in the crisis.  There’s what some people have called “the McDonough paradox”: it’s the worriers who are going to solve the problems for those who aren’t worrying much. Not only will they solve the problem; they’ll seize its opportunities. Since the only constant in modern life is change, those who are ready to change will be the ones who prosper.

AR: Are people knowledgeable about products? 

WM: No. It’s so confusing. There are so many green claims in the marketplace based on different frameworks. We’re seeing people promulgating products as having recycled content, but what if you’re recycling toxic products? The nice thing about cradle to cradle is it asks a very simple question: are you cradle to cradle or not? It’s not very complicated.

AR: Corporations seem to be jumping on the bandwagon because of the commercial implications. Could you talk a little about the implications of this for you as a planner and designer? What does it mean to you that a broad group, not just a few, are interested and engaged?

WM: Two aspects are exciting to me in terms of my work. One is that many people are adopting cradle to cradle and the specific strategies that Michael and I are proposing. It’s a framework that can be understood by anyone. Things go back to nature; they go back to industry. The result is clean water, clean air, people being treated fairly, and life goes on. The other is that with so many people taking this up, I can now move on to the next level. Clients have become sophisticated, which allows us to continuously push the envelope. So we don’t market ourselves; we respond to the marketplace.

AR: That’s interesting. Do you have competitors?

WM: We’ve been careful not to compete with other people.  We just want to do our work. The Latin root for compete, competare, means “strive together,” go forward together. I think I’ve also made a considered judgment not to expose my work broadly, but rather to expose the ideas broadly. And our ideas are not inconsistent with other peoples’ good ideas. Other groups may be very focused on, for example, efficiency or being less bad; we’re focused on being more good, because being less bad is still being bad. It’s good to be less bad but it’s insufficient. Most of the people with whom we might compete are still efficiency people, and so we don’t really compete with them.

AR: Tell me how your work started in the U.S., but grew international.

WM: My first building was in Jordan. When I graduated from Dartmouth, I followed my professor of urban planning to Jordan as a field representative for the 100-year master plan team for the Jordan Valley. I lived with the Bedouins, building settlements for them. After being nomads for millennia, they were settling, due to border closings in Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon. We had to figure out what it meant to settle a Bedouin.

AR: So early on you were thinking internationally?

WM: I always thought I’d be a U.S. ambassador, because when you grow up overseas and look for an American male role model, it’s going to be an ambassador.