Introduction: Phenomenology is the science of phenomena distinct from that of the nature of being. Phenomenology can also be understood as the study of structures, experience and consciousness (Norberg-Shulz, 1980) [2]. Phenomenology can be explained as a means of going beyond “narrow, empiricist psychological assumptions about human experience”(Dermort, 2000) [3]. Phenomenology of architecture is theoretically constructed on the paradigm of observed and interpreted human experiences and behaviors towards physical sites through the analysis of sensory influences. Phenomenology’s approach acknowledges the complexity of double-fold levels of knowledge: ontological or objective, foundational characteristics of the life-world, and epistemological, where lived experiences become a primary source of self-knowing, developing richer, authentic perspectives through our emotions, sentiments and memories [1].

 

Literature Review : Merleau-Ponty [4] pioneered applied phenomenology, founded on the nature of perception expounded by Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger, who theorised that conscious experience from the first person’s point of view, derives from perceptual dimensions.Perceptions, the instrument connecting our physical bodies through sensory organs (i.e. sight, sound, taste, touch and smell), enables us to experience the world intelligently and intimately, form the foundation of our creative receptivity and the subjective intertwining of each person’s self with others [5]. Seamon [6] elaborates the development of consciousness through perceptual awareness as the lived aspect of innate material experiences, and researchers’ need to be constantly involved in some aspect of the world as their object. Finnish architect Juhani Pallasmaa [7] focuses architectural phenomenology discourse as an intellectual form of ‘inner language’ of spaces, by philosophically examining the experiences preceding from authentic “emotional forces” through introspection. This field of research, he states, is fraught with the challenge of ocularcentrism: looking at the surface, rather than seeing to understand the metaphysical.

Juhani Pallasmaa[7], makes a case against the dominance of vision overall senses in the way we perceive the built form in his book, The Eyes of the Skin. The author terms this bias as ‘Ocularcentrism’. His argument uses a critical lens to examine architecture that appeals to the eye but does very little to engage with the other senses. 

Divided over two parts; the first is an elaboration of Modernist Design and how its isolation of the body and other senses makes our memories and imaginations homeless from the architectural experience. The eminence of vision has led to an ocular-centric architecture that aims at creating a striking and memorable visual image of a building. This does not allow us to experience our being in the world, and instead makes us mere spectators of an image that is projected into the eye. A historical narrative of how an image has gained predominance and sight becomes the most privileged of all senses over time. The second part brings the body to the centre stage.

 

“I confront the city with my body; my legs measure the length of the arcade and the width of the square; my gaze unconsciously projects my body onto the facade of the cathedral, where it roams over the mouldings and contours, sensing the size of recesses and projections; my bodyweight meets the mass of the cathedral door, and my hand grasps the door pull as I enter the dark void behind. I experience myself in the city, and the city exists through my embodied experience. The city and my body supplement and define each other. I dwell in the city and the city dwells in me.” ― An excerpt from The Eyes of the Skin

 

Architecture is not merely an object for visual seduction. It is an extension of nature in the man-made realm. Similar to a forest, that engages and heightens all our senses to create and envelopes with stimuli, architecture that is life-enhancing must address all the senses simultaneously. To further this point, Pallasmaa draws our attention to the process of design with the advent of computer technology. The digital process of design may certainly help create new possibilities and push the boundaries of construction but it tends to flatten our magnificent and multi-sensory imaginations. A physical model brings the designer in haptic contact with the form creating a simultaneous act of being inside and outside the built form. Historically, the human body has been an essential aspect of deriving the proportions of space in architecture. Buildings are not only objects that we inhabit, but we also respond to them in an equal measure [7].

 

Conclusion: The essence of change itself encourages us to keep searching for humanity’s “wonderful possibilities” [1], however, architects’ intellectualised removal of personalities from the process of designing, much favored in the modernist movement of the 20th-century until the recent decade, has resulted in an emotive void, hampering aesthetics from becoming an integral part of the intelligent, intimate cognition of places, landscapes and topography.

 

Phenomenological architecture visited in this research shows the importance of metaphysical interpretations of “pure looking” [10], where the aim is to appreciate the simplicity of structural design, light, shadow and space as the context of perceptual experiences that move, change and even fundamentally orchestrate landscapes, revealing fully the human spirit [8]. Phenomenological association between human perceptions, space and form can be studied in various architectural concepts. Acknowledging phenomenology’s application beyond the domain of theoretical scholarship is crucial; human perceptions must not be neglected but instead integrated into spatial architectural designs bearing our sensory experiences. Pallasmaa [9] believes that for buildings to embellish meaning and embody memories, they should do more than reflect practical environmental realities of planning geographical and physical spaces to fit surroundings. By abstracting our emotional connections and perceptual awareness, phenomenological architecture expresses the sanctity of human contexts, capturing empathy, joys, sorrows and the shared experiences of people’s lives, their feelings, memories and consciousness.