START WITH SENSATION
location | Fenway, Boston
date | Spring 2021
recognition | Honors in the Discipline
“Start with Sensation” is an investigation of the effects that architectural design has on people’s moods, feelings, and desires. Through an analysis of texts and precedents from history and the present, this project argues that the spaces we live in represent our cultural values and aspirations and that if sensation was the starting point to design, our buildings would yield representations of the people we love and visions of happiness instead of spaces that trigger traumas and cause feelings of anxiety. This project will take the form of an architectural manifesto with design guidelines and an interactive art installation to engage with the public.
What if the sensation was the starting point of design? Everyone feels something when they engage with a space. A room or building can trigger trauma or remind you of past love. The power of architecture and its influence on our feelings lies behind design decisions and reasoning. If we consider whether we are going to feel vulnerable or strong inside of a space, then we have to be aware of our sensations. Architects in the past have ignited age-old debates about aestheticism.
Today, we value profit over form and admire efficient technical solutions over romantic reactions. I argue that we can design with feelings first, by taking note of what scholars in the past have said about sensationalist theory in architecture and what people today are trying to define in terms of emotional reactions to design. Through the means of an architectural manifesto and an art installation, I aim to expose the reality that designing with sensation first can yield elegant, happy, powerful spaces that not only represent our culture of today, but that aspire for better.
