Object to Experience: Understanding Perception to Create Events

“The task of architecture is to make visible how the world touches us” - Merleau PontyArchitecture is an intimate experience that has to be appreciated and comprehended as images of body and skin. However, modernist ideas and the technological culture have separated the senses distinctly allowing the human body to become a mere spectator of built objects. In today’s virtual world, a sensorial exploration of space has the potential to evoke a transparency of time, space and feeling; thereby reinforcing human existence.The thesis explores man’s perception of the built environment and the language of materials to create a rich sensual journey. That is, in shifting our attention from the object to the experience of the object, the project strives to reconnect to humanity, relating to the human body and culture.The design project involves the creation of a series of architectural interventions along a pedestrian street in Over the Rhine neighborhood, Cincinnati. The sensual journey with nodes of episodic moments shall address the thesis agenda of enhancing architectural experiences.