To Convey with Architecture: An Exploration on the Communicative Capacity of Architecture

Abstract

Advances in technology has allowed for an unprecedented three-dimensional complexity in architecture. There is a liberation of form and an unknown potential of new spatial experiences with increased abilities for articulation and evocation. This makes one wonder whether architecture may have a similar non-verbal communicative capacity to other art-forms such as music, painting and photography. And if so, why should architecture communicate and how can it be done? This thesis is an introspective reflection to understand my own experiences and how I perceive architecture. Numerous architectural examples are analysed in the first two chapters and the third chapter provides a critical reflection on how some of my designs have explored the communicative ability. These include the articulation of materiality in The Wood Pavilion, capturing the expressive essence of an art-form in Home of Flamenco, and evocation of certain emotions in the Island of Broken Promises. These previous projects inform the thesis design, with a conscious increase in the complexity of the brief and programmatic requirements, to see the influence of this on the design process. In the era of globalization, the built environment and its inhabitants share a reciprocal search for identity. The design of an international cruise terminal explores ways in which architecture can reinforce local identity and convey a memory of the city. Located on the Bledisloe Wharf of the Auckland city centre waterfront, site research is conducted through methods of urban morphology. Plan sequence maps of urban development around Bledisloe Wharf reveal the disappearance of the natural headland, Te Rerenga-ora-iti, or Point Britomart. Today, only two signages along sidewalks acknowledge the natural landmark’s existence. The historic headland is proposed to be the conceptual driver for the new architecture on Bledisloe Wharf. In providing an international cruise terminal for Bledisloe Wharf, how can architecture evoke Point Britomart, a historical landscape that used to exist? Point Britomart is understood to be the wider coastal environment that surrounds the cliff itself. Natural processes determine the physical experience on the littoral edge, and they occur simultaneously and at different speeds, gradually changing the coastal cliff condition. These processes inspire the functional experience of the cruise terminal, while photographs, 3D-printed and plaster models explore a visual aesthetic that translates the idea of gradual change. Is a tectonic of gradual change possible in architecture?