Nicolas Berggruen

The biggest determinant in our lives is culture, where we are born, what the environment looks like. But the second biggest determinant…

— Nicolas Berggruen

Everybody is different and I think that we live in a material world. But for me, possessing things is not that interesting.…

— Nicolas Berggruen

California is a place of invention, a place of courage, a place of vision, a place of the future. People who made…

— Nicolas Berggruen

I am not that attached to material things. And the good thing is I can make choices. I have very few possessions.…

— Nicolas Berggruen

L.A. is very special to me, so far away from my world on the East Coast, Europe, Asia. It's a bit of…

— Nicolas Berggruen

Possessing things is not that interesting. Living in a grand environment to show myself and others that I have wealth has zero…

— Nicolas Berggruen

Singapore has been incredibly well-managed. It was created out of the swamp, with a strong emotional idea: a safe place for mostly…

— Nicolas Berggruen

I understand the human instinct to want to create a nest and possess things, to show them off, but for me personally,…

— Nicolas Berggruen

Other people might have family - three kids or five houses. In my case, that doesn't exist. I'm going to give everything…

— Nicolas Berggruen

I can drive. Let's just say you don't want to be in the passenger seat.

— Nicolas Berggruen

I don't get that much enjoyment out of saying 'I own it.'

— Nicolas Berggruen

Everything I do now is about growing the pot to have more to give away,

— Nicolas Berggruen

Think of everything in Seattle - Microsoft, Amazon, Starbucks. Then you go down to Silicon Valley - Intel, Apple, Google, Facebook, Twitter.…

— Nicolas Berggruen

Brunch is boring, but that's part of the charm of it.

— Nicolas Berggruen

I don't mind staying in one place for a while - I like to spend a lot of time in Los Angeles.…

— Nicolas Berggruen

This is a bit like big-game hunting. You look for companies of a certain size that deserve to be public.

— Nicolas Berggruen

Whatever I own is temporary, since we're only here for a short period of time. It's what we do and produce, it's…

— Nicolas Berggruen

I was living in Paris, which is a very beautiful, very wonderful place, but a tight place as a city, a tight…

— Nicolas Berggruen

I felt I was owned by possessions.

— Nicolas Berggruen

I don't have a house, and I don't have a lot of time for socializing, so every year I have a party…

— Nicolas Berggruen

Most countries in Africa have the capacity to be great agricultural producers, but they do only subsistence production. So a family will…

— Nicolas Berggruen

If you erased New York, I hate to say it, if you erased Frankfurt, even London, the world would not have changed.

— Nicolas Berggruen

I wish I was a great writer or a great journalist or a great scientist or a great artist; I'm not.

— Nicolas Berggruen

If you have things and if you are a perfectionist, which I am, you have to really tend to them, and it…

— Nicolas Berggruen

California has something which not every place in the world has: It has what I would call a sunny side, and I…

— Nicolas Berggruen