Experiencing Architecture- Exploring the Soul of the Eye

This paper is an attempt to understand the influence of architectural settings on people; why certain architectural experiences stays with us whereas others vanish. It is a first step in an approach towards a greater understanding of subject and as such its starting point is purely theoretical. We proceed the investigation by exploring two perspectives on the issue: a) a phenomenological perspective, based on the book “The Poetics of Space ” by the French philosopher Gaston Bachelard and b) that of neuroscience. Both of these approaches view the human experience of architecture from starting points of the relationship between our mind and our physiological experience of the world. Neither of them separate physiological experience from the intellectual experience of place. Bachelard states in the “The Poetics of Space ” that the psyche is a place, and the house is an extension of that place. He opens the door to places of significance to us, something neuroscience does as well. Both perspectives emphasize the early childhood experience of architecture which they feel has a major impact on the individual and his/her later environmental experiences, though they have different arguments for how this impact occurs. The motivation to simultaneously investigate phenomenological and neuroscience approaches to architectural experiences is in order to introduce a new perspective on architecture and its impact on us. This new perspective on architectural experience could become a new approach towards a more humanistic and supporting architectur