This is an open note methodology that is in constant development. A design method that is fluid and constantly changing throughout discoveries, practice, research, influences, etc.
Base Thought
As I’ve grown older, I’ve become even more fascinated with the concepts of space and place, particularly the cyclical pattern of how place influences identity, identity shapes ability, and ability, in turn, reinforces place. I resonate with the word topophilia and the psychology it describes, “a strong sense of place, which often becomes mixed with the sense of cultural identity among certain people and love of certain aspects of such a place.” I love the connection we build to where we are and how it can empower – or strip – who we are and who we think we are. Because of this identification with certain places, we design and construct the architecture of our spaces to show ourselves externally what we want to see within ourselves.
Notes:
1. Prophetic Aesthetic, “A prophetic aesthetic calls us to talk about what it means to raise generations of architects with a multicultural sensibility who will think about architecture not just as a profession but who will think about spaces that everyday people inhabit and about our accountability toward making those spaces wonderful and inhabitable space.” Art on My Mind: Visual Politics. 1995. bell hooks.
2. “Perhaps it is the sense of place that gives us the belief that passionate things, in some essence, endure.” Some Notes on River Country. 1944. Eudora Welty.