The Film Sense
What Neuroscience is Telling Us
When you design and integrate an architectural feature to engage your building occupant, how do you think it affects them? For example, suppose your occupant is walking toward your building and is just about to enter it — during their approach they can see a waterfall feature just on the other side of the glass which separates the exterior from the interior. How do they process your interior design before ever entering it? Do they actually hear that water feature on the other side of the glass which they can only see?
Such are the questions which leading neuroscientists are uncovering. In fact, findings are indicating that when people are presented with only a visual of something, they do actually hear it. So, even though that interior waterfall is acoustically cut off from the exterior, your occupants will still form a perception of it which is made up of processes beyond the visual.
In the article entitled The Brain Hears Just by Seeing in Scientific American, you can listen to a podcast which describes what is happening with the brain when visual cues stimulate auditory perceptions. You will learn that although people may just “see” something, like a rooster crowing, activity in the brain of the observer actually shows a “lighting up” in their audio cortex — similar to how it would light up if they were actually hearing it.
So as it turns out, the different human senses cross-relate and inform each other in some pretty sophisticated ways. This is something you should definitely understand as you design your built environments.
How to Take Findings about Synchronizing Senses a Step Further
A wonderful book which you should read is called The Film Sense
I like this book because I think it is critical for you as an architect to understand how Read more
Image: JoshuaDavisPhotography. COM | Flickr
The notion of having dispositions, or records, that your brain keeps as it experiences architecture is quite an interesting thought. If every time your occupant has an architecture experience that can later be rewritten, then your role as an architect is to design for more than a real-time experience. You must also design for your occupants by incorporating what your architecture will say to them — what they will store in their memory, and how that memory will influence their future experiences.
Here is a quote discussing such dispositions from an article entitled, Science Studies How Architecture Affects the Brain:
“Architectural experience is recorded in what Antonio Damasio calls “dispositions” — records in our brain of a combination of sensory inputs, memories, emotions and any related muscle memories. Just below the surface of consciousness these dispositions wait for the next experience with which they can be paired. For example, each time we enter the office in which we work we are recalling a dispositional record of our last visit — including any emotional experiences we may have had. When we leave our office at the end of the day, our brain creates a new dispositional record that updates the one we came with that morning.”
The key word here is “update”. Previous architecture experiences impact the current, and the current will influence those which have not yet happened. Does this mean that you should design spaces that are less predictable? Or spaces where repetition and routine abound?
As an architect, it might be difficult to make a Read more
Abstract of a color processor inside the human brain.
Makes me wonder about how well we express color.
Image: Frank Bonilla Abstracts.tv | Flickr
How do you, as an architect, get to the bottom of what your occupants really need and want? Do you do this mostly be talking with them? Presenting different architectural design schemes to see which one they like best? Or do you study their behavior to understand what moves them with regard to the things that cannot be expressed by mere words?
I recently came across this quote that I thought might be an interesting place to begin a discussion about environmental psychology for architects:
“Research shows that only 5% of what the average person thinks can be expressed verbally. […] The other 95% is hidden deep within the subconscious.”
– Click here to read the article.
If the above statistic is true, then how do you as a designer wrap your head around the other 95% underlying what your occupants really want? Also, how can you increase the chances of creating a design that will, in fact, work — adding behavioral, emotional and intellectual response to what goes into making an architecture work functionally successful?
Five Techniques to Leverage Your Architectural Design Efforts
The following are five tips to help you, as an architect, incorporate key architectural psychology design principles while you design. These can be great starting points to shift your mindset — and can especially be coupled with your programming efforts: Read more
Individual atoms in a 90 nanometer scoop of Nitinol.
Image: jurvetson | Flickr
Why does inspiration strike when thinking about building design in terms of a convergent assembly of elements? Well, here is an explanation about just what a “convergent assembly” means for manufacturing at the molecular level.
Todays manufacturing methods are very crude at the molecular level. [...] One robotic arm assembling molecular parts is going to take a long time to assemble anything large — so we need lots of robotic arms: this is what we mean by massive parallelism. While earlier proposals achieved massive parallelism through self replication, today’s “best guess” is that future molecular manufacturing systems will use some form of convergent assembly. In this process vast numbers of small parts are assembled by vast numbers of small robotic arms into larger parts, those larger parts are assembled by larger robotic arms into still larger parts, and so forth. If the size of the parts doubles at each iteration, we can go from one nanometer parts (a few atoms in size) to one meter parts (almost as big as a person) in only 30 steps.
The Future of Scalability in Architecture
As if to build upward from some sort of DNA structure, building an assembly of parts at smaller scales then fitting that assembly within a larger assembly give should give you “food for thought”.
What if, as an architect, you could design a sort of “DNA seed” from which your buildings would grow, not only as they are built, but also as they age over time? Could your initial design “seed” create a better Read more
image: batintherain | Flickr
Your architectural design reverberates.
Yes, architecture maintains walls made up of materials and even wayfinding systems that convey important information; but, the beauty and function that radiates from an incredible architectural work into the soul of those that experience it is often the culmination of seemingly invisible effects exuded by that designed “place”.
Pay much attention to the “invisible” and “intangible” effects which your designs radiate, as these things can Read more
Image: fudj | Flickr
Going to the theater is usually an invigorating experience. A good production definitely considers the orchestration of numerous stimuli…all in an effort to feed the senses. Similar to architecture, theater set design must work to create an experience with space, and often such theatrical experiences tap into so much more that just the visual sense.
For this reason, architects can learn a thing or two from good theater set design and performance.
Space Filled with Dynamic Moments
What goes into producing an entire theatrical experience rests upon more that just the actors. There is an entire environment that revolves around them — everything from the theater building itself to the often dynamic and jaw-dropping stage environments.
As architects we can learn a lot from film compilation, music composition and story narrative; but the subject of theatrical design and performance is often an underplayed topic. If you think about it…how often can you see a synthesis of Read more
News Update
Sensing Architecture is Featured in ARCHITECT Magazine, Nov. 2009
You can access the Feature Article here.
Image Credit: Tracy Powell
Here is an introductory excerpt written by Braulio Agnese, Sr. Editor:
SensingArchitecture.com, at the Nexus of Building Technology and Neuroscience
“How does memory play a role in the way we experience buildings? Or sound? Or optical illusions? What do advances in computing, power generation, lighting, materials, etc., mean for building design? How can “smart” environments affect our behavior or our mood for the better? And what about biomimicry? These are the kinds of issues Maria Lorena Lehman blogs about at Sensing Architecture…”
— ARCHITECT Magazine[Click here to read the rest of this article.]
About Sensing Architecture
If you are new to Sensing Architecture, I invite you to visit (click here to visit), particularly if you are interested in architectural design, science and new technologies.
At Sensing Architecture you will find:
- A repository of useful articles for architecture professionals and scholars. These articles aim to give you forward-looking ideas to drive architectural progress.
- Fresh content is added regularly to help you learn about innovative design concepts and solutions.
- Unique perspectives expand the way you think about architecture and design.
- By exploring the science of how occupants perceive space, Sensing Architecture will teach you how to bridge the gap between new technology and architectural design — helping you to design more effective and humane state-of the-art environments.
Name: Sensory Design by Joy Monice Malnar and Frank Vodvarka
URL: Sensory Design
Purpose: to explain in-depth and clearly how humans interact and perceive architectural design
THIS BOOK IS MUCH NEEDED IN OUR DISCIPLINE
Sensory Design is a book to really make you, as an architect, more aware of how your designs impact people. Taking and in-depth look at how humans perceive space and built form, Sensory Design is really quite a remarkable publication.
Written by Joy Monice Malnar and Frank Vodvarka, every page is filled with insight that will help you to become a better designer. Their unique way of presenting diagrams, illustrations and photographs really help to make an otherwise complex topic easy to understand.
Many of you, my readers, email me looking for a good resource on the topic of human perception and architectural design. Very often, I find myself recommending this book. In fact, there are very few books that seriously delve into the topic of sensory perception and design in such a detailed fashion. It brings modern day practice together with historical trends and then it ties theories together with findings about the brain to really help designers understand why certain design decision might work and why some might not.
Again, Sensory Design is a great find as it is much needed in the architectural discipline.
WRITTEN FOR A DESIGNER — ABOUT THE HUMAN PERCEPTUAL PROCESS
As you’ve probably heard me say before, the topic which this book covers is very important for architects and other designers to understand. Plus, I like that the authors go an extra step further by explaining human perception from a designer’s stand-point.
I think it best to show you what I’m talking about. Here is an excerpt that I particularly like: Read more
Image: Steve Kay | Flickr
IT ISN’T WHAT IT USED TO BE
I discovered a site that has a thought-provoking section on workplace by design. Read this introductory quote to get you thinking about workplace design and what principles you use to create healthy and productive work environments.
The workplace today is a result of historical innovations that were designed to make the workplace a productive environment. However the world of work continues to change, and the design factors that once were helpful are adding less value than they once did. (1)
Today, workplaces must answer to a wide range of needs using various new technologies and design principles that not only foster productivity — but also creativity. In addition, workers want to work in healthy, stress-free environments that promote everything from spaces for focus to spaces for social interaction. Work environments need to meet a multitude of needs at once, and that is why Read more
Image: andyj682 | Flickr
WHEN THE HUMAN EYE BLINKS…
Did you know that the second most complex organ in your body after your brain is your eye? (1) The human eye contains many processes all working together to help you perceive visual queues in a continuous way. However, when foreign matter or heightened stimuli (like loud sounds or bright lights) occur, a blinking reflex is activated — and usually when one eye blinks the other follows.
GEOFF MANAUGH ON “BLINKSPOTS”
In a thought-provoking post entitled Architecture of the Blink, some interesting questions surface regarding how blinking might affect our perception of architectural design. In this article, Geoff Manaugh explores “blinkspots” — moments or spaces where blinking shuts down our awareness of less important details.
This got me thinking…
DO YOU WANT A “SECOND LOOK”?
When architecture is more “interactive”, with more moving and/or flashing elements, does that mean occupants will Read more
