JOURNAL
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Published: 2026-09-28

18 June 2017

There are some ideas I’ve been reading about and I am trying to find a framework for tying them all together. Phenomenology, Aesthetics, Architecture, Physical, Mental and Emotional Health. Phenomenology, as I understand it, is perceiving the world through our senses. Experiencing it first hand, Zen like, with no ideas, preconceptions or filters. Aesthetics is often classified as the study of beauty. It originally meant knowledge gained through sensory perception. So in that way it relates to phenomenology and is more than a concern about art, style, or surface characteristics. My evolving definition of architecture is “the thoughtful organization of human activities in space.” Places we design for ourselves or places we inhabit designed by others to house activities that are important to us. Physical, mental and emotional health are maintained in situations where we are free from the pressures of negative stimulation.

Beauty may be pleasurable sensations, or the experience of useful and delightful information. “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” To behold means to engage, to pay close attention, to study, to experience deeply. 

Physical comfort means being in a temperature range that suits the activities being performed. Indoors this means neither being too hot or too cold, avoiding drafts and humidity levels that are too low or too high. Outside this can mean being in the shade, near a fire or out in the open under conditions. For everything else, there is clothing as an environmental filter. Mental health in this case just means conditions that support concentration, thinking and learning, as well as relaxing. Emotional health is freedom from fear. To this I mostly mean non-verbal subconscious feelings. Negative stimulation and social situations impede our emotional health.

These concepts all revolve around residential architecture. The building itself, the grouping of dwellings of which it is a part, and the social conditions that arise or are fostered in it. Community. Food. Sharing. Caring. Social Activities. Wellness. Financial Stability.

Books I’m reading to grasp these ideas.

Adam Sharr - Heidegger for Architects

Jonathan Hale - Merleau Ponty for Architects

Steven Foulds - A Simple Guide to Being and Time

Maurice Merleau Ponty - The World of Perception

Tarthang Tulku - Skillful Means

Rachel Carson - Silent Spring

Michael Pollan - Food Rules

Paul Bloom - How Pleasure Works

E.F. Schumacher - Small is Beautiful

Charles Taliaferro - Aesthetics

Leonard Koren - Which Aesthetics Do You Mean?

Leonard Koren - Wabi Sabi

Leonard Koren - Undesigning the Bath

David Abram - The Spell of the Sensuous

Robert Tavernor - Smoot’s Ear

Richard Neutra - Survival Through Design

Rob Hopkins - The Transition Handbook

A goal of mine is to bring these ideas to focus and find some insight that will directly inform my design practice but also lead to a paper or presentation at the 2018 ANFA conference. I want to put this wisdom to practice and to show it in practice. Theory is not enough.

Architecture which delights all of the body’s senses instead of annoying them through harsh lighting, unwanted noise, flimsy materials, and odors. Life and nature will do unpredictable things. The aspects of buildings that can be predicted should be designed to enhance our experiences.

“Arguably, if we see something as beautiful, we are more likely to protect it and not exploit it.” Charles Taliaferro