Representing Pasts – Visioning Futures
Abstract
Architects produce sketches and digital renders to visualise their design ideas to clients. These drawings act as visual prototypes to communicate the design and manage the expectations of the client. Occasionally, these visuals afford clients to epiphanously articulate their memories and experiences however, understanding how visualisations afford spatial memories and experiences is rarely considered in the design process. Visualisations that afford place memories can deliver greater insight into the imagined affordances of the client and can be used as a method to evaluate the necessity and desirability of what was proposed. This comparative case study examined two visualised future environments in Melbourne, Australia. Through 1) architects’ design presentations for a to-build architecture competition and 2) a video manipulation of an existing underutilised post-industrial waterscape environment. We found that such visualisations afforded associations with place memories and spatial experiences and infer on the necessity and desirability of these visualised future environments. Based on our findings, we proposed a framework to help researchers and designers elicit different aspects of the viewer’s tacit experiences. The paper concludes with recommendations for designers and researchers on how to implement the framework with their visualised designs to elicit viewer’s experiential insights.
Damian Rogers is a registered architect with over twenty years of professional experience practising under Damian Rogers Architecture. Damian’s key area of research is urban waterways and public space. As a PhD candidate, his research focuses on the perception and affordance of water as a public space and the opportunities for post-industrial urban waterways to enhance a sense of place through the sensory experience of water. Damian is also a design tutor at Swinburne University in Melbourne and provides extensive practice experience to students.
Dr Linus Tan is a research lead at Design Factory Melbourne and studio leader at the School of Design and Architecture, Swinburne University of Technology. His research focuses on reflective practice and design behaviour in architecture, design and innovation practice.
Professor Anita Kocsis is the Director of Design Factory Melbourne, Swinburne University, an experimental co-creation platform part of the 35+ Design Factory Global Network. Anita’s 15+ years of transdisciplinary practice is the intersection of art, design, and science.
8:30 pm - 10:30 pm
Friday 2nd December, 2022