Architecture as Atmosphere

Architecture is a complex process of spatial and temporal organization, which is conceived, developed, felt, and communicated also (and above all) through its atmospheric manifestations. Atmosphere is the essence of affective qualities we sense in our surroundings that confers identity and meaning to a situation or place. In the last three decades, investigations about atmospheres — aimed at comprehending, experimenting, and representing their expressive properties — have been drawing remarkable attention. From the end of the 20th century, some scholars have even observed an ‘atmospheric turn,’ a ramification of the more general ‘affective turn’ that bloomed in the Humanities in the early to mid-1990s. There is an ever-increasing enthusiasm for the atmospheric approach in architecture: today, atmosphere represents a crucial element for design practice and critical discussion, as well as architectural teaching. It satisfies the pressing need for bodily felt experiences and emotionally arranged ambiances. This IDEA2023 presentation illustrates the jagged background that an architect should develop to manage the multidisciplinary essence of an atmospheric education. It is the occasion to show how it is possible to combine architectural theory, (neuro)physiological methodology, and experimentation in virtual reality. Specifically, the discussion focuses on the most recent experiment we carried out at the P\Lab2003 directed by Professor Bob Condia at Kansas State University (Manhattan, Kansas). The priming potential of atmospheres is a deep-rooted intuition among architects, but we must consolidate evidence by collecting empirical data. We want to transform a design intuition into an informed intuition.The theoretical premises of this abstract and the physiological-signal-based experiment illustrated during the IDEA 2023 Symposium were developed within the RESONANCES project — Architectural Atmospheres: The Emotional Impact of Ambiances Measured through Conscious, Bodily, and Neural Responses. This project received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement no. 101025132. The content of this text reflects only the author's view. The European Research Executive Agency is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information it contains