Most of us remember buildings in a surprisingly fragmentary way.
We do not usually remember the plan, the architect, or the date of construction. We remember something smaller and more intimate; the entrance hall, a staircase turning in shadow, a shaft oflight, a view through a window, the sensations of a particular room. Martin Heidegger has spoken of the phenomenological meanings of dwelling vs building and the philosopher Gaston Bachelard posited that houses are not merely structures but containers of memory. He wrote of a connection and interaction of ‘resonances and reverberations’ with these places. They hold moments of life within them; a home, a school hall, a chapel, a workplace, a public place, may remain vivid decades later.
Architecture therefore works not only through design, but through direct experience, and through a more profound connection.
A building shapes how we move, where we pause, where we gather, how we associated and how we feel in its present presence. Some spaces calm us, feel protective and intimate. Some feel monumental or overwhelming.
This becomes especially interesting in that buildings that stay with us are not always the most famous or beautiful ones. Often these are places that intersect with a particular moment in our lives. The building therefore becomes meaningful when place and personal history meet. This explains why two people can experience the same building in different ways for example:
One remembers the light or the shadows.
Another remembers the silence or the sounds.
Another remembers who they were with and the feelings.
When we speak about a building that matters to us, we speak not only about the architecture but the relationship between place, memory, and identity. Time and space become occasion and place.
Preparation for session
Choose a building, dwelling, a built place that is important to oneself, where we have spent significant time. One we can readily revisit with memories and have personal photographs of.
Retrieve a photograph(s) of this place and send to Steve.
Please note that participation in the meeting is only possible if a choice is made and shared.
Participation will be by individual testimony shared.
The three sources are for background interest but will not be critiqued in the session.
Optional reading:
- The Architecture of Happiness: Alain de Botton, 2006 Vintage.
- The Poetics of Space: Gaston Bachelard, 1958 (2014) Penguin Classics.
- Building, Dwelling, Thinking By Martin Heidegger