Bringing Back Emotion and Intimacy in Architecture | Adrian Bica | TEDxRyersonU

good afternoon I'm here to tell you all a story about a relationship you never knew you had this is a problematic relationship which has evolved from diminishing emotions and general misunderstandings this toxic affair is between you and the current state of architecture design once moved us architecture was involved with a sense of spiritual satisfaction and wonder it touched us with a sense of beauty intimacy and memory and offered us an emotional platform to which we could better understand the human collective to which we all belong now whether it ever really achieved this or not is not what I'm here to talk about I'm here to outline three reasons why architecture is not currently reaching this plateau and what we can do as a society to realign our thinking with these more humanistic principles the first was a transformation that happened at the end of the 17th century when scientific thinking rejected the interpretive and non tangible aspects of architecture resulting in buildings that were no longer concerned with their relationship to humanity it's as if buildings became their own individual objects having little or no interest with the people they contained things that could no longer be measured lost their place within the role of design and many of the existential factors which influence the creation of our society's lost traction as we adopted the Cartesian grid as our new architectural Bible as a result the practice of design was transformed into a technological science focused on optimization low cost and efficiency and although or important principles that should influence the design of architecture we may be placing too much emphasis on these because buildings that once looked like this have started looking like this the second is the development of an urban culture rooted within privatization and individualism up until the 18th century life occurred within the public realm is a form of relaxation enjoyment and social engagement people enjoy being on the streets and it was the place where one felt connected to the greater social establishment that constituted their society we now see the public through a different set of eyes it's a place of transition between the places we are and the places we want to be we treat those who stand in our way as obstacles and as we hurdle over our fellow citizens we make sure that our thoughts eyes and bodies never meet being in public is no longer desirable and architecture has started reflecting these principles creating exclusively private spaces our kotecha used to engage the social complexities of society but as we've shifted away from the public realm architecture that looked like this started feeling like this the third is the commodification of architecture into a mode of branding as architecture entered the service industry it became a marketing strategy and in so doing eliminated the potential for genuine emotions in response to creative design solutions consider for instance the design of fast-food chains hundreds of identical buildings spread across the world resemble products more than they do the creation of our societies we preserve beautiful historic architecture because rooted within its construction are the values principles of that specific time period we as a society invested in architecture and with that investment came character and identity of some of the major cities of today if we were to consider ourselves as part of an elite Historical Preservation team of the future would we consider what we're building today worthy of preserving I think mostly not and I think it's because buildings that felt like this are being processed like this now design is typically grounded within design principles and I think if we were to expand our list to include the following three we could once again reinvigorate architecture alleviating the negative effects of some of the previously mentioned movements the first is the consideration of architecture as a story we love stories stories engage us they make us think and best of all they make us imagine if we reflect back to grade school English class we might remember a chart that looks like this this is a graphic illustration of a narrative structure a series of incidents obstacles and even disasters formulate attention leading to a high point creating a climactic experience in much the same way architecture can take us along for a ride should we choose to design it to do so much like a story architecture has an introduction today we came off of Bay Street and we were brought into a large reception area that took us into a stairwell we were introduced to the building as artifacts on the walls reflected the building's history and as we continued up the steps we were introduced to the building's past this massive area is the heart of the narrative it's where we'll spend most of our day and where a series of incidents obstacles and disasters could lead to something amazing and climactic the conclusion of our architectural story will be in a place we have not yet visited the space is bright engaging and offers us the opportunity to end our evening through social engagement concluding our our architectural story now although this building wasn't created with the purposes of telling an architectural story the way we experience it is much like a story and I think if we were to adopt the telling of narratives as fundamental design principles we could once again reinvigorate buildings so that they can be worthy of exploring the next is the consideration of architecture as an emotional relationship I'd like everybody to consider a time in their childhood when a space affected you so strongly that all other thoughts in your mind disappeared completely as children it was easier to immerse ourselves with an experience because as we were growing up there was so much unknown buildings affected us emotionally and the relationship between us and the built world was dynamic and exciting now as we understood the world more and more architecture challenged us less and less and although it can be tempting to blame the natural process of learning as being the reason for the loss of mystery I think the wildly underwhelming state of architectural experience may be more to blame than we may realize Julia Bermudez from the Catholic University of America conducted a research study where over a thousand participants were asked to describe their most intimate architectural experience more than half of the responses included the word emotional so if our most intimate architectural experience is described as emotional why are we choosing not to design to attain it I believe if we were to consider architecture as an emotional relationship we could once again rekindle the flame of architectural modern society the third is the consideration of architecture as a piece of craft modernism looked to reduce the UNECE ntral aspects of architecture but taking these reductionist principles and pushing them to absurdity has sterilized architecture from a design process that fosters character we often see sleek modernist buildings that hide all details so that the pure form of the building is uncompromised by the joints that create it now this type of thinking undermines the potential aesthetic beauty that comes with a beautiful material assembly if you think back to a time when you came across an item whose pieces came together in such a unique way that it almost seemed poetic I would like to see the same from our architecture to give you an example I've put together a few details here that come together either through interlocking puncturing tightening or clamping the accentuation of each of these pieces visualizes the inner workings of the detail and in so doing allow a relationship between the person viewing the architecture and the architecture itself I'd like to conclude my talk with the proposal of a challenge for the audience as leaders of tomorrow it will be us to define the future of architectural ambition although it can be tempting to believe architects alone are not the only ones who decide how our buildings will be built the general public has a huge influence on the decisions decisions that lead the creation of our society's my challenge for the audience is to consider yourself part of the architectural movement starting right now I challenge you to mentally equip yourself so that when you are given the opportunity to play a part in the creation of our cities you can be confident that your decision will lead to a positive influence in our future architecture thank you

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 47,344

Rating: 4.8567495 out of 5

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, Canada, Design, Architecture, Industrial design, Urban Areas

Id: DNqL3iA5xKE

Length: 11min 37sec (697 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 24 2016