Biophilia Perception of The Environment

Biophilia:
Perception of the Environment

Melanie OBrien

Biophilia
Perception of the Environment
Melanie OBrien
07473613
Supervisor: Elizabeth Shotton
Master of Architecture Programme

School of Architecture, University College Dublin.
January 2014

ARCT40610 UCD MArch Dissertation Biophilia: Perception of the Environment
The Broken water-jar
The rain...
Eyes of shadow-water
eyes of well-water
eyes of dream-water
Blue suns, green whirlwinds,

bird beaks of light pecking open
pomegranate stars.
But tell me, burnt earth, is there no water?

Only blood, only dust,
only naked footsteps on the thorns?
The rain awakens...
We must sleep with open eyes,

we must dream with our hands,
we must dream the dreams of a river seeking its course,
of the sun dreaming its worlds,
we must dream aloud,
we must sing till the song puts forth roots,
trunk, branches, birds, stars,
we must find the lost word,
and remember what the blood,
the tides, the earth, and the body say,
and return to the point of departure...
[Octavio Paz, 1955]

Biophilia: Perception of the Environment
Abstract
Biophilia is the connection between the natural environment, the human body and the mind1. It argues that
this is an inherent and necessary consideration for the built environment in order to maintain human
stability and comfort.
The human mind has evolved to be capable of higher executive mental function, such as creativity,
innovation and abstract thought. This marked the turning point in our evolution, however we still have
those primitive inclinations which rely on having present the basic needs for survival to remain satisfied and
dormant.2 When these fight or flight systems are triggered, they override the conscious mind, decreasing
capacity of other aspects such as productivity, concentration, memory and general mental functionality, and
increasing levels of tension and anxiety.3
It is not a new concept; on the contrary, there is a persistent thread of thought surrounding mans
relationship with nature throughout history. In art, architecture, literature, and all other creative disciplines,
there is a fluctuating narrative as to what our optimum relationship with nature should be. Biophilia, as
Wilson introduced it, has materialized itself in many built environments of the past, but not under this
relatively new term.4
Firstly, part I maps the origins of how and where these parallel thoughts emerged to offer insight
into the role Biophila could play in the design of future environments. Secondly, the human body is a
complex entity, and the mind infinitely more so, part II endeavors to understand some of the relationship
between these and the built environment. In bringing these two studies together, greater clarity will be
achieved into the potential biophilia holds to become an enduring platform on which to discuss architecture.
Fig i: 1 St Marys Lane, Dublin. 1964. Robin Walker.

1 Kellert, Stephen R. Building for Life: Designing and Understanding the Human-Nature Connection. Washington: Island Press,
2005. P 124.
2 Fromm, Erich. The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness. NY: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1973. P 365.
3 Kellert, op. cit., P 123.
4 Wilson, Edward O. Biophilia. Cambridge, Mass. and London: The Harvard University Press, 1984. P 1.

Acknowledgements
nothing can come of nothing

Joshua Reynolds
There are several people without whom this dissertation would not have been possible.
To Dominique Hes, for sparking an interest that lead me to pursue this subject.
To John Olley, for his inspirational essay, Drawing that has remained in my memory years after many others
had long disappeared.
And above all to my supervisor Elizabeth Shotton, for her constant invaluable input, guidance, and for
keeping me on track despite my wanderings.

Abstract
Acknowledgements
Preface
Part I
Ch 1 Word
Theory needs a term
Biophilia, a new brand?
Ch 2 Biophilia
The acknowledgement of human habitat
The roots of Biophilia
Environmental sensuality, bias toward the visual
Ch 3 Nature
Humanitys identity in a changing world
Art lineage of a fluctuating relationship
Reverberations of the great movements
Part II
Ch 4 Abstraction
Kellerts biophilic elements
Man as an abstract thinker
Perception; imaginative input
Ch 5 Scale
Domesticated man
Extensions, the veils of modern life
Conclusion
Bibliography
Appendices
A1 A walk through a Biophilic house
Boyd House II, Melbourne, Australia.1958. Boyd, Robin.

Preface
Spatially, architects seek to increase connection with the natural world by way of blurring the line, or
threshold between indoor and outdoor space. Creation of room from garden, extending living space into
the outdoor realm, these are concepts we as architects are familiar with.
Something we often dont question is why is this important? Why create an outdoor space for
regular use? The answer is because we crave connection with the natural world. Be it a fresh breeze, a seat
in the sunshine, or simply hearing rain fall on the roof; we are innately lulled into comfort and contentment
when we connect with the greater natural world around us.
Biophilia aspires to increase quality of life, improve productivity, concentration and memory, induce
fewer social problems in society as compared to environments devoid of its traits, enhance healing and well
being, and assert general connectedness with community and the surrounding world.5 It seems too good to
be true; therefore it begs the question as to why is this not a more common term in the world of
architecture and planning.
Great architects have intuitively sensed these things, without [probably] even articulating or
being able to articulate why they did what they did. It just seemed right.6
I propose that what we are now understanding to be biophilia has existed in our built environment for
millennia. Since man has been capable of influencing the environment that he occupies, he has had the
ability to choose or alter what that environment may be. We are generally familiar with the Chinese term,
Feng Shui, and possibly less so with the Indian Vastu Shatra. These are philosophical theories with ancient
origins concerned with harmonising human existence with the natural environment.7 They emerged from
entirely different cultures, however the principles encapsulated in these methodologies are very similar to
those now being defined in the concept of biophilia; access to light, air and natural environment all in an
effort to create calming, sensual space.8
The word biophilia first appeared in the writing of the widely read German-born psychologist Erich
Fromm in the 50s, however it was not until Edward Wilson, an American biologist picked up the concept
and began writing some years later that the concept gained velocity. Attributed as the father of the idea,
Wilson was later joined by others, most prominently by Stephen Kellert who now writes extensively on the
importance of biophilic design in the built environment.
How we perceive our world is central to understanding how biophilia influences our emotions. An
architect or designer cannot replicate nature, but they can replicate engagement of the senses as a
connection to the natural world arouses. We as humans are abstract thinkers, we have the ability to see or
experience one thing be it language, a painting or sound and envisage another. It is this ability to abstract
meaning that allows connection to the living world to offer comfort, transferring us experientially elsewhere.

5 Kellert, Stephen R., Judith H. Heerwagen, and Martin L. Mador. Biophilic Design: The Theory, Science and Practice of
Bringing Buildings to Life. Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, 2008. P 123.
6 Heerwagen, Judith speaking in Finnegan, Bill. "Biophilic Design: The Architecture of Life." 60 minutes. USA: Tamarak
Media, 2011.
7 Bramble, Cate. Architects guide to feng shui: exploding the myth. Oxford: Architectural Press. 2003. P 24.
8 Kellert., op. cit., P 111.

Part I

Word
What's in a name? That which we call a rose

By any other name would smell as sweet9
Biophilia is a relatively new term, endeavoring to spark a new way of understanding. It is an approach to
design; a set of attributes to be taken into account, although these considerations are nothing new nor
revolutionary, consisting of simple features such as access to natural light, to fresh air, or to calming natural
sounds.10
Biophilia is not positioned as a new movement, or as an original term. It is, however, the new
acknowledgement of an often-unnoted phenomenon; the theory that we, as humans are inscribed with an
innate affiliation with all things living.11
Theory needs a term
nothing comes harder than original thought12
A theory that can only be conveyed through extended explanation cannot resonate as powerfully as one
that has been awarded its own word. There is instilled in the reader or listener, a level of acceptance when
an idea has its own title. This stems from our own way of thinking. What sets the human apart from our
other living neighbours on this planet is our ability to think abstractly to experience one thing, but imagine
another. The act of naming is just that giving abstract expression to something completely different. It is a
game of association, as experience grows, so too does the ability to formulate and link abstractions to their
corresponding reality.13
A word offers something for the mind to grapple with. It becomes the anchor, the pivoting point
a thing. It forms an object in the minds eye even if it is an abstract one it has longevity, something that
the explanation or definition has not. The bestowal of its own word solidifies the idea and allows it to be
more easily remembered. The definition of any term has malleability; the ability to be questioned and to
change, but there always endures that milestone of thought the word. The trajectory of future thinking
can be pushed and pulled, the angle of its focus can move, and the extent of its coverage can alter once it
has been given its own word.
Biophilia is highly theoretical, and therefore is difficult to offer concrete evidence as proof. It is
operating in the abstract world of emotion and unconscious thought, and as such is almost infinitely broad. If
we are inherently attracted to living things, at what point do we begin to suffer when they are absent? And
what level of absence has an effect on human emotion? Is there a timescale to this proposed phenomenon?
The point at which we begin to suffer from the absence of connection to living things is very difficult to
define, mostly as it is a highly subjective issue. No two individuals will respond emotionally in the same way,
or to the same level, as personal experience is the most dominant contributing factor, however there are
more general factors that can be understood, such as culture.
The word, biophilia, offers an over-arching idea under which theories and hypotheses may be
tested. Bio- refers to the life or living organism aspect of the theory, and -philia (being the opposite to -
phobia) means a positive feeling or liking. What the word allows is tangibility for the mind to place the
meaning in the context of other knowledge. Biophilia is a theory, and it is as of yet, often an unfamiliar one,
however, in having its own title, learning what it is can be contextualized alongside other relevant knowledge.
That is to say, explaining to an individual what biophilia is, will prove much easier than simply explaining the
merits of design which follow the same principles, under the idea that we have an innate need to connect
with our greater environment. It allows one to question what is that? Instead of what do you mean?
Many words carry with them particular or established associations and connotations, as such the
use of a word with an emerging idea requires thoughtful approach. One such example is in a study
conducted by ethologist specializing in the study of animal behaviour John Calhoun of social behaviour

9 Shakespeare, William. Romeo & Juliet, Act II Scene 2.
10 Kellert, Stephen R., Judith H. Heerwagen, and Martin L. Mador. Biophilic Design: The Theory, Science and Practice of
Bringing Buildings to Life. Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, 2008. P 123.,
12 Ibid., P 66.
13 Anderson, John R. and Bower, Gordon H. Human Associative Memory: A Brief Edition. Hilldale, New Jersey: Lawrence
Erlbaum Associates Publishers. 1980. P 65.

that accompanies over-crowding that can result in physiological consequences.14 Calhoun studied, over a
three-year period, the lives and behavior of four wild rat colonies. As the experiment progressed, he began
to notice what he termed as the behavioral sink as gross distortions of behavior began to emerge as a
result of the overcrowded conditions. The unhealthy connotations of the term sink were not accidental, as
the behavioral sink aggravates all forms of disease and anti-social behavior already found within the group.
This study and newly coined term has gone on to be used widely as an animal model of societal
breakdown, and even as a touchstone for psychology and urban sociology.
Biophilia, a new brand?

The fact is, we are a materialistic society, and often even that which is in our best interest needs a degree of
branding to evoke our engagement. When sustainability emerged, it was a toned-down and more readily
acceptable form of the hippy movement of the 60s. It was new, different and exciting. Now, it is old news,
and a tired subject of conversation. How so can it be dressed up into a marketable image, and become
something that we can buy into and follow like some new trend?
The concept of sustainable design emerged around a time of crises as many new movements do
around the 50s and 60s when negative environmental impact was becoming apparent as a result of
irresponsible consumerism. Later the movement gained momentum around the 70s with the emergence of
the oil crisis when the issue began to grasp a foothold in the political scene with such milestones as the1972
Limits to Growth Report and the Stockholm Conference.15
It was undeniably a great revolution of thought at the time or its emergence, but the word
sustainability has lost power and desirability as time has passed. We are used to hearing it, we are used to
considering it and can accept many of the necessary implications it is having on our world we all now
leave the cardboard out of the waste bin and put it aside for recycling but it has become a stagnant
concept. Maybe it was always destined to be as such, being labeled with a word that means just that to
sustain what is already there, remaining the same, and staying still. At the time of the 70s oil crisis whereby
people began to panic that the world was running out of this essential resource, the promise of stocks
staying at the same level would have been a provocative thought, but now, theres an inactivity about the
word that is wholly uninspiring.
The word biophilia originally appeared, not with the man who has been attributed as its father
Edward Wilson but in the work of Erich Fromm, a German-born, American social psychologist. He
described biophilia as; the passionate love of life and of all that is alive: it is the wish to further growth,
whether in a person, a plant, an idea, or a social group.16
As well as being, on the whole, a materialistic society, we are also one that demands clear, distilled
ideas before they can be accepted. Like mathematicians, we need to establish an elegance to make vast
notions easier to grapple with.17 Fromm was the first to use the word biophilia, but he did not push the
concept, nor was it the main focus of his work. He wrote extensively about the principles of human nature,
and introducing this new word, he opened the door on a newly coined concept that was to be built upon
by others. Fromm did not adequately distill biophilia to become clear and evocative enough to flare a
following.

14 Hall, Edward, T. The Hidden Dimension : Man's Use of Space in Public and Private. London: The Bodley Head Ltd, 1966.
P 21-32.
15 Helios, The University of Huddersfield. The History and Chronology of Sustainable Development. Module outline for
Sustainability for SMEs. <http://helios.hud.ac.uk/scomjm4/mmport/susmod/Page2.htm> Accessed 12th Dec
2013.
16 Fromm, Erich. The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness. NY: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1973. P 365.
17
Wilson, Edward O. Biophilia. Cambridge, Mass. and London: The Harvard University Press, 1984. P 60.

Biophilia
So what is biophilia? Like with most questions, there is a long and a short answer. In the words of Wilson,
and not dissimilarly to Fromm, it is the innate tendency to focus on life and lifelike processes, however, in
his highly personal book titled Biophilia, there remains an ambiguity as to the design-implications of the
idea.18
The acknowledgement of human habitat

Biophilia is a new way of rationalizing why connection to the environment is important, but more
importantly, it is concerned with how to go about implementing particular principles to create a more
successful human habitat.19 Too readily, we forget that we are animals; there are important elements to
retain in our living conditions. The reality of the majority of modern lives today, is that most of our time is
spent in buildings they are our new default habitat. Wilson, an American biologist considered the
worlds leading authority on myrmecology; the study of ants was the first to begin thinking of biophilia in
practical terms; how it applied to our living environment.
The emergence of SBS or Sick Building Syndrome in the late 1970s initiated a shift in thought
regarding the nature of our indoor environments. There transpired an acceptance that their quality could
impact our health; a concept that would prove innovatory to our design process. Like biophilia, this was not
an original thought, but it was a sign of acceptance that there existed in our designs, the potential for
negative effects. This sparked a new paradigm; there was a willingness to change.
Fig ii
Fig ii: Clerical workers in the Pentagon. 1950. (<http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21878739>

Accessed 17th January 14.)
The roots of Biophilia

In an earlier work, The Heart of Man: Its Genius for Good and Evil of 1964 Fromm refers to Biophilia in a dark
light as the tendency to preserve life and to fight against death is the most elementary form of the
biophilious orientation, and is common to all living substance. Inasmuch as it is a tendency to preserve life,
and to fight death, it represents only one aspect of the drive toward life.20 His view is a pragmatic one we
require a level of connection to the natural environment in order to survive. Its a difficult theory to fault.
He was concerned with the elementary aspect of Biophilia very much the why we might have
such an affiliation with nature, rationalizing it greatly in terms of survival of species. The dark undertones
about escaping death contrast greatly with his later writing where he views it in a much more positive light
seeing it as a highly constructive trait.21 He notes that humans are the only species who struggle so greatly
with why and how we are here on this planet at all, and he too appears to struggle with defining his own
inclination towards the natural.22 This struggle can be attributed to our tendency toward abstract and
symbolic thought, and our attempt to decipher the highly elusive purpose of our lives.

18 Wilson, Edward O. Biophilia. Cambridge, Mass. And London: The Harvard University Press, 1984. P 1.
19 Fromm, Erich. Human Nature and Character. In Man for Himself: An Inquiry into the Psychology of Ethics. London:
Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd., 1947. P 366.
20 Ibid.. P 47.
21 Fromm, Erich. The Heart of Man: Its Genius for Good and Evil. NY: Harper & Row, 1964. P 45.
22 Fromm, Erich. "Human Nature and Character." In Man for Himself: An Inquiry into the Psychology of Ethics. London:

Undoubtedly, this conflict is eased by religion; arguably the most persistent form of abstract and symbolic
human thought. Fromm admits that to many individuals, life and existence alone presents a problem. It is a
highly confronting choice of word, but one which is not entirely out of place, self-awareness, reason, and
imagination have disrupted the harmony which characterizes animal existence Reason, mans blessing, is
also his curse23 With this heightened-awareness of self alongside the capacity for abstract, calculated
thought, the inner conflict to rationalize purpose and existence can manifest itself in a sense of lost control.
Fromm argues that it is a negative attribute of man that we see ourselves as separate from nature and other
creatures, but acknowledges that it is this very separation that weighs heavily on the mind and produces a
sense of disorientation, he is set apart while being part; he is homeless, yet chained to the home he shares
with all creatures.24 He chooses to convey these ideas through a deep layer of negative associations
reason as curse, existence as problem, and being chained. His most positive statements are made in
his later writing, The biophilous person prefers to construct rather than to retain. He wants to be more
rather than to have more.25
Fromm was an observer and critic of human forces. To him, biophilia was one of these. He saw it
as a positive response to negative existence. However he was often subject to criticism for his morbid and
suicidal implications in his texts, and this is no different in his reference to biophilia. He did not capture his
readers imagination with his idea of biophilia, and his use of the word largely went unnoticed.
Wilsons 1984 book, Biophilia, is a very personal account of his own responses to nature, and contends our
affinity with nature is evident throughout humanity in both science and the arts. He firmly believes its
presence in all individuals to some degree, and that there exists not only a fundamental, but genetic need to
be connected with the natural environments.26 As a biologist by training, it is not unexpected that Wilson
would be in pursuit of this hypothesis of it having biological roots, but it left him open to wide skepticism
and criticism.27 The desire to connect with the natural environment Wilson argues is; responding to a deep
genetic memory of mankinds optimal environment.28 The fundamentals of the human brain offer some
insight into the reasoning behind this innate need to connect with the natural world, alongside the
evolutionary path from savannah to modern life which has influenced its formation.29 The brain consists of
three basic cerebral types which are physically and chemically different, but which function together.30 The
most ancient part is fundamentally reptilian, and has a primary role in instinctive functions such as
determining territory, hunting, shelter, social hierarchies and fight or flight responses. The next part to
develop was the limbic, or primitive cortex, which plays an important role in emotional, hormonal and
organ functions. The latest part to develop in man and so-called higher mammals is significantly different to
the others, and is what accommodates conscious thought. In man, this culminates to become the rational
mind of symbolic thought and calculation.31
Wilson argues that the primary system overrides the tertiary when it detects a threat or warning.32
In order to avoid this sense of threat, this primitive part of the brain is genetically programmed to require
sensual connection to the prevailing original habitat in which the brain evolved?.33 It is in this statement
that there is difficulty. The concept of reverse evolution regarding the capacity for genetic memory in a
species, concerned with the relationship between physical features and environment was investigated by
Michael Desai, an American evolutionary biologist.34 In observing several generations of Drosophilia, or fruit
fly, he found that reversion to an ancestral genetic state relied on standing genetic variation, that is to say,
the physical features most suited to the environmental condition in question had to still be present in some

23 Ibid., P 40.
24 Fromm, Erich. The Sane Society. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. 1955. P 23.
25 Fromm, Erich. Human Nature and Character. In Man for Himself: An Inquiry into the Psychology of Ethics. London:

27 Kahn, Peter H., The Human Relationship with Nature: Development and Culture. Cambridge, Mass. and London: The MIT
Press. 1999. P 26.
28 Ibid., P 111.
29 Ibid., P 109.
30 Tuan, Yi-Fu. Topophilia: A Study of Environmental Perception, Attitudes and Values. Engelwood Cliffs, New Jersey:
Prentice-Hall Inc., 1974. P14.

31 Ibid., P 14.
32 Wilson. Op. cit., P 103.
33 Ibid., P 106.
34 Desai, Michael M. "Reverse Evolution and Evolutionary Memory." Nature Genetics 41, no. 2 (2009): 142-43. P 142.

of the living population for them to notably re-emerge; Thus all populations maintain an evolutionary
memory their past has much to say about how they evolve in the future.35
This experiment does not prove Wilsons point, but it does raise an interesting question; could
man revert to a more ancestral state if the conveniences of modern life were removed from him? We may
be many more generations passed the time when we lived in our ancestral environment than the short-
lived drosophilia, but the fact that we still retain a limited capacity for instinctive response implies that there
remains also in our ancestral brain the standing genetic presence that Desai spoke about. We lived for a
much longer time in the natural environment than we have now in this modern condition of being removed
from it, and so we have ingrained in us the instinctive predisposition to respond positively to configurations
that were favorable for survival or the ongoing well-being during evolution36 This is what biophilic design
aims to evoke instinctive reversion to a simpler, calmer state stimulated by a more natural, uncomplicated
environment.
Environmental sensuality, bias toward the visual

The world is experienced and understood through the senses sight, touch, smell, hearing, and taste. Like
the captive animal in a zoo enclosure, we require a level of environmental stimulation. What biophilia
executes is an enrichment of the human habitat to satisfy unconscious needs, evoking engagement. This is
achieved through connection to nature, or attributes commonly experienced in our native natural
environments37. This is a point Wilson iterates, saying humans will walk into nature, to explore, hunt, and
garden, if given the chance. They prefer entities that are complicated, growing and sufficiently unpredictable
to be interesting.38
There exists a longstanding association between healing and natural environments; be it relaxation,
respite, or even recovery from physical illness.39 In modern life, we have removed so much of the sensual
experiences we are equipped to receive.40 The multi-sensory landscape is closely linked with the natural
landscapes that promoted human survival and reproductive success, it is the position of biophilia that we
have retained the capacity for such landscapes to nurture human physiology and promotes emotional well-
being.41 Findings from over 100 studies have shown that stress reduction is one of the key benefits of
spending time where all the senses are ignited in the wilderness, especially, according to Ulrich, in those
resembling the savannah.42
Tim Ingold a British anthropologist writes extensively on our need to reconnect with our
environment. In his essay Culture on the Ground he refers to the groundlessness of metropolitan life now
experienced so extensively in developed cultures.43 He suggests that the barriers weve become
accustomed to placing between our bodies and the surrounding world inhibit our ability to engage with and
understand it.44 This lack of engagement generates a disconnectedness that can formulate the very
disorientation Fromm spoke of.45
In a way this can be attributed to the longstanding bias toward visual experience in design.
Pallasmaa argues that we hear with our ears, feel with our hands and smell with our nose, and taste with
our tongue, all at the same time as we see with our eyes.46 We may not always be consciously aware of this,
but that does not mean that they are not having profound effect over our perception, and our emotions.
Architecture is a careful game of choreographed interaction between built form and the human body, as
such it is a commonly discussed idea as to why are the other senses so often neglected or ignored in design.
To answer in biological term, much more data is fed to the nervous system through the optic nerve than

34 Desai, Michael M. "Reverse Evolution and Evolutionary Memory." Nature Genetics 41, no. 2 (2009): 142-43. P 142.
35 Ulrich, R. Stress recovery during exposure to natural and urban environments. In The Journal of Environmental
Psychology. 11. 201-230. 1991. P 212.
37 Kahn, Peter H., The Human Relationship with Nature: Development and Culture. Cambridge, Mass. and London: The MIT
Press. 1999. P 18.
39 Kahn, Op. cit., P 13.
40 Ingold, Tim. "Culture on the Ground: The World Perceived through the Feet." Journal of Material Culture 9, no. 3
(2004): 315-40. P 315

41 Kahn. Op. Cit.,. P 13.
42 Ibid. Ulrich, cited in Kahn. P 13.
43 Ingold. Op. cit.,. P 316.
44 Ibid., P 321.
45 see note 22. Fromm. Op. cit., 1947. P 366.
46 Pallasmaa, Juhani. The Eyes of the Skin: Architecture and the Senses, Polemics. London: Academy Editions, 1996.

through the other sensory organs; it is a more complex system.47 Throughout our evolution we learned to
rely heavily on this sense and so it has developed at a greater rate than the others. We rely, however, on
the sensory data from other fields to correct the visual field generated from this information. Psychologist
James Gibson conducted much research of this, he was an advocate of the importance of integrating
kinesthetic the sense of feeling felt deep in the muscles of the body which allow it to adjust and move
smoothly in conjunction with visual experience to understand reality, kinesthetic 48
Despite its complexity, our sense of sight is subject to many limitations. We commonly understand
that depth is perceived by the use of two eyes, but this is in fact only true if short distances.49 Passed this
point, we rely on the other sensory data we have at our disposal to determine distance, such as sound or
memory this limitation actually presents the opportunity to trick the eye more easily, something which
we most advantageously exploit in visual art. It is unfortunately often the case that our urban spaces
provide little excitement or visual variation and virtually no opportunity to build kinesthetic repertoire of
spatial experience, effectively stifling our sensual experience.50 It is through this experiential repertoire that
we learn to interpret the world around us, limiting this in our environment will in turn limit our abilities to
perceive. Like how the mind becomes rusty when a once well-known piece of knowledge is not exercised,
so our ability to use our senses diminishes when they go unused. Their sensitivity may be unaffected, rather
our interpretation of them becomes less proficient, therefore it is important to retain diversity of experience
to exercise and utilize our sensual capacity.

P 21-32. P 65.
48 Gibson, James J. Spatial Perception and Spatial Behaviour. In The Perception of the Visual World. Cambridege, Mass.:
The Riverside Press, 1950. P 223.

49 Gibson, James J. Theories of Perception. In The Perception of the Visual World. Cambridege, Mass.: The Riverside
Press, 1950. P 16.

50 Hall. Op. cit., P 62.

Nature
Humanitys fascination with nature is an understandable one; nature constitutes our planet, our environment,
and as such, our home. It provides for us, withholds from us, and generally, is in control of the lives we live.
Through the centuries, our relationship with nature on the whole has at times transformed and shifted,
gained popularity and waned out of favour, but it is a robust theme, with an ever-present potency that
draws our interest.
Humanitys identity in a changing world
The distinction between the world created by man culture and the world in which man
exists nature- has been perhaps the single most important mental category ever conceived.51
If Biophilia proposes that we are inherently inclined toward all things living, is there now a gap in the debate
as to what exactly is living? Plants are living, animals are living, and we are living, but what of greater nature?
What of the wind, the water and the sky these are all elements of our natural environment, but they are
not necessarily living. They are, however, elements of life. If these elements are also included under the term
biophilia, its scope broadens even further still. In accordance with Wilsons theory of biophilia, he does not
limit our feelings of affiliation to other life, but also to life-like processes.52
Fromm argued that the emergence of man occurred at the point that instinctive adaptation
reached its minimum, giving way to conscious awareness and calculated responses. It was at this point that
man broke from the world around him and began to see himself as different to other animals.53 Like the
adolescent breaking from the security and network of the family, this new independence brought with it all
the struggles of establishing a new identity.
We live in buildings; we spend most of our lives in them. They are our self-assembled habitats. We
leave them to enter the natural world, and often feel we need to leave the realm of the urban world to
truly experience nature. When we got to this position is unclear, with the indoor condition being almost
entirely separate from the external one two opposing worlds looking at each other through the openings
we permit.
The further we move into the arena of sustainable design; placing the natural world in higher
regard as something to be conserved and protected ironically, we can often move farther away from it.
The incorporation of so-called green bling may increase our frequency of encounters with natural objects,
but there is a removal from emotional attachment that counteracts the intended positive impact. When a
building is identified as being of architectural significance, or a piece of our past is awarded high historical
value; the tape goes up, the barriers are erected, and people are held at whatever distance is deemed
necessary to protect that newfound relic. It may be put on show, but it is an unnatural engagement of look,
but do not touch. The piece becomes an isolated object removed from its context, an abstraction of its
authentic self.
We have accepted that our cultural world, that which is made by man for man is growing and
changing at rapid speed, and that this is having a negative impact on the natural world around us, but this
concept of one being almost entirely separate from the other is a relatively new one. There is now a
conscious effort to re-acquaint the two to bring them together in a more integrated way, however
Societies often borrow environmental features from one another without necessarily changing their own
social patterns.54 If we as a society have moved our culture so far from the natural world, then there is a
sense of the moves occurring to bring the two back together as often being contrived simply as superficial
tokens.

51 Forty, Adrian. "Nature." In Words and Architecture: A Vocabulary of Modern Architecture, 220-39. London: Thames &
Hudson, 2000. P. 220.
Routeledge & Kegan Paul Ltd., 1947. P 39.

54 Latham, Alan. "Researching and Writing Everyday Accounts of the City: An Introduction to the Diary-Photo Diary-
Interview Method." In Picturing the Social Landscape: Visual Methods and the Sociological Imagination, edited by
Caroline Knowles (ed.) and Paul Sweetman (ed.), London and New York: Routeledge, 2004. P 218.

Fig iii Fig iv
Fig iii: Suburban Utopia often didnt live up to expectation. Neighbourhood street, Smithtown, NY.
(<http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/kbenfield/whats_wrong_with_this_picture.html>
Accessed 17th Jan 14).
Fig iv: Trees out of context in a shopping centre. Southglenn Mall, Col. US.
(<http://www.labelscar.com/colorado/southglenn-mall> Accessed 17th Jan 14)
In order realign our thinking about built and organic worlds, cultural and natural environments; we must
first understand what propelled us to this point; it has not been a simple linear path, but a morphological
route affected by a multitude of events and circumstances. However, our collective view of nature has
been consistently presented through the arts under its many guises. It is an undeniably recurrent theme,
rising and falling as human interest has pushed and pulled its locus around the world. Through the arts and
sciences we have attempted to understand the world around us, and it is through science and art that we
can trace our cultural morphology.
Art as lineage of a fluctuating relationship
any full history of the uses of nature would be a history of a large part of the history of human
thought.55
Art displays the values and trends of the artist, however every artist is operating within a cultural context;
their work encapsulates the views relevant at their time. Art is a universal language, devoid of the many
connotations associated with literature, powerful enough to cross cultures; it reads the code of human
nature.56
It was Kellerts line of research that began looking at peoples attitudes and values regarding nature,
distilling it into a set of applicable design principles. This research spans a career of twenty years, but in brief,
he identified nine values.57 The utilitarian value emphasizes the material benefits to be gained from
exploitation of nature. The negativisitic value emphasizes the feelings of fear associated with nature. The
dominionistic value emphasizes the desire to control and assert dominance over nature. The naturalistic value
emphasizes the many satisfactions to be gained through direct experience with nature. The ecologistic-
scientific value emphasizes the systematic study of natural systems, patterns and functioning of nature. The
aesthetic value emphasizes a pleasurable emotional response from the physical beauty of nature. The
symbolic value emphasizes how we use natural symbolism for communication. The humanistic value
emphasizes the capacity we hold to care and form bonds with nature and animals. And finally the moralistic
value emphasizes the conscience we retain in our conduct toward the natural or non-human world.
Most of us can see merit in one or more of these values, and we can begin to understand what
our own view is toward nature. So too can it me applied to art, and the many great works can generally be
placed under one or more of these themes. Since the foundation of civilized humanity, the most primitive of
artworks we have pursued our innate fascination with the natural world, depicting animals, scenery and life

55 Williams, Raymond, quoted in Forty, Adrian. "Nature." In Words and Architecture: A Vocabulary of Modern Architecture,
220-39. London: Thames & Hudson, 2000. P. 220.
56 Wilson, Edward O. Biophilia. Cambridge, Mass. and London: The Harvard University Press, 1984, P 62.
57 Kellert, Stephen R. The Value of Life: Biological Diversity and Human Society. Washington: Island Press. 1996. P 26.

sources.58 Before printing enabled widespread publication of imagery, storytelling was the first broadly
reaching form of communication. The Bible, as one of our first widely known texts, often circulated in the
form of colloquial story telling, solidified the position of nature in the celestial realm, and as an object of
veneration. Eden, the garden of God on Earth, is where the origin of mankind itself was attributed. It was
paradise, but even it was rife with power and danger in the form of the serpent and poison apple.59
Fig v: Fig vi
Fig. v: The Garden of Earthly Delights. Bosch, Hieronymus,1480-1505.

(<http://www.spanisharts.com/prado/bosco/delicias.htm>, Accessed 17th October 2013).
Fig. vi: Hunt-Lennox Globe. Engraved Copper terrestrial globe. Ca. 1510.
(<http://exhibitions.nypl.org/treasures/items/show/163>, Accessed 18th October 2013).
It is this kind of sinister symbolic layer of darkness and power that gave rise to humanitys obsession with the
idea of retaining distance, and later achieving dominance over the natural world. Similar iconology was seen
as the age of discovery became more widespread. The Lennox Globe is one of the oldest terrestrial globes in
the world, dating to 1510, and is only one of two known maps to be inscribed with the latin script HC
SVNT DRACONES, meaning Here be Dragons. Medieval and Roman examples are also known to label
such undocumented regions as Here be Lions. It was common practice to decorate maps with depictions
of such wild and venerated creatures.60 These are clear examples displaying Kellerts negatistic value of
nature as something to fear, and also his symbolic value using commonly shared symbolism of nature to
communicate meaning.61
Nature was long seen as the pinnacle of beauty, a perfection to aspire to, or a wilderness to be
enhanced. One of the first models for the discussion of beauty and architecture was with Aristotles view
that generally art completes what nature cannot bring to a finish, and partly imitates her. This became the
shared attitude of many seventeenth century art and architectural theorists.62 It set art and the hand of man
completely apart from nature, and yet admitted its desire to imitate its qualities. However, the first challenge
to this idea came in Claude Perraults Ordonnance of the Five Kinds of Columns; neither imitation of nature,
nor reason, nor good sense in any way constitutes the basis for the beauty people claim to see in
proportion and in the orderly disposition of the parts of a column.63 Perraults idea sparked an alteration in
view that beauty resides in the object; and instead emphasis was moved to the arrangement of objects the
constructed view. This is consistent with Berninis skepticism of the high value bestowed on the study of
nature; he saw it as a flawed, imperfect thing in need of the artists skill. His view was not to follow and
study it blindly, but with a selective eye; nature is always feeble and niggardly artists who study it should
first be skilled in recognizing its faults and correcting them.64 It was highly fashionable at the time of these

Hudson, 2000. P. 220.
60 The New York Public Library, rare book division. The Hunt-Lennox Globe in Treasures.
<http://exhibitions.nypl.org/treasures/items/show/163> (Accessed 26th November 2013.)
61 Kellert, Stephen R. The Value of Life: Biological Diversity and Human Society. Washington: Island Press. 1996. P 26.
62 Aristotle, Physics, Book II, quoted in Forty, op. cit. p. 220.
63 Perrault, Ordonnance of the Five Kinds of Columns, quoted in Forty, op. cit. p. 221.
64 Bernini, 1665, quoted in Forty, Adrian. "Nature." In Words and Architecture: A Vocabulary of Modern Architecture, 220-39.
London: Thames & Hudson, 2000. p. 226.

philosophers to take on the great challenge of defining nature. The various views can be placed under the
overarching themes of architecture is like nature, and architecture is nature.65
This conflict can be seen quite explicitly in the manifestations of the 18th century English landscape
garden, which generally followed the view that Nature is incapable of pleasing without the assistance of
art.66 Initially, there was a long-standing traditional fashion for formal gardens and pattern originating in the
French garden, which elevated the aristocratic idea of obedient nature above the untended or working
landscape. This style gave way to the constructed view; often to distant follies or false relics of antiquity, in
which the grandeur of the Grand Tour was re-created for supposed contemplation and enjoyment. Later
beauty was seen in a controlled, false wildness. This was never so evident than in the ha-ha a defensive
ditch in the landscape near a great house that allowed the illusion of proximity to natural wilderness or
livestock, while in fact any apparent danger was physically inhibited. It became fashionable to admire not the
rolling hills of well-tended gardens and farmland, but the windswept openness of the ocean and mountain.67
While the tone of the attitudes morphed greatly, it presents nature as an ever-present concern
through civilized humanity. There remained a level of respect and admiration, however it took its form.
Fig vii Fig viii Fig ix
Fig vii: Gardens of Versailles. 1662-1700. Le Ntre, Andr. (<http://www.jardineriaramal.es/blog-

los_jardines_del_palacio_de_versalles_paris.3php>, Accessed 10th January 14).
Fig viii: The Rotunda, Stowe Gardens, Buckinghamshire. 1730. Kent, William.
(<http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/837206. Halling, Phillip.>, Accessed 10th January 14).
Fig ix: Chatsworth Garden. 1759. Brown, Capability. (<http://janeausteninvermont.wordpress.com>,
Accessed 10th January 14).
Reverberations from the great movements

It is undeniable that the social and cultural context influences the views and values of any given time, but
there are certainly times of immense shift that can be attributed to greater changes. The most significant
shift in thought regarding nature of our age, as previously mentioned, was the initiation of the environmental
movement of the 1960s, whereby a re-invented nature has returned to the vocabulary of architecture.68
The conventional way of seeing and talking about our relationship to nature was questioned, and turned on
its head. There was rapid advance in technology and ideas associated with the modernist movements, which
fixated environmental concerns at the fore of social interest.
Art Nouveau, or new art, saw an explosion in organic form in architecture, and was a break from
so-called academic art. It was a total art style, manifesting itself in all forms of visual art.69 Tassel House by
Victor Horta is a famed architectural example. The reference to nature and organic form is evident, and to
be in this space is to physically occupy a piece of art. Theres a fantastical element that is difficult not to
enjoy. This indulgent space draws its inspiration unquestionably from the natural world.

Hudson, 2000. P 220.
66 Chambers, 1772, quoted in Forty, Adrian. "Nature." In Words and Architecture: A Vocabulary of Modern Architecture,
220-39. London: Thames & Hudson, 2000. p. 227.

67 Jarrett, David. The English Landscape Garden. London: Academy Editions, 1978. P 46.
68 Forty, op. cit,. P. 220.
69 Duncan, Alastair. Art Nouveau: World of Art. New York: Thames & Hudson. 1994. P 7.

Fig x Fig xi Fig xii Fig xiii
Fig x: Staircase. Tassel House, Brussels. 1893-94. Horta, Victor.

(<http://www.studyblue.com/notes/note/n/midterm/deck/19020>, Accessed 16th January
14)
Fig xi: Detail of wall decor. (<http://hanser.ceat.okstate.edu/6083/victor_horta_tassel.htm>, Accessed
16th January 14)
Fig xii:: Plan of entry. Source as above.
Fig xiii: Vestibule. Source as above.
Manifestations did not stop at floral or organic form, but went on to curved lines often giving rise to a sense
of movement or life. Art Nouveau design is dynamic, evocative and engaging, however, it can be a little
overwhelming. The visual impact of these spaces was so powerful that they left little room for the other
senses.
Louis Sullivan was prevalent in the States in this same period. Working in the rapidly growing cities
of America where steel frame systems were opening up the possibilities for high-rise skyscrapers, there was
an emphasis on practical use above aesthetics. He famously coined the phrase form follows function, and
has also been called the father of modernism.70 His signature style, however, is in fact his organic
ornament that often adorned the exterior of his buildings. Eruptions of vines and celtic-inspired motifs
adorned his facades, emphasizing and celebrating the structural lines. To Sullivan, a high-rise must be every
inch a proud and soaring thing, rising in sheer exultation that from bottom to top it is a unit without a single
dissenting line.71 Sullivan held nature in high regard, and wanted to bring its aesthetic pleasure into the
world of the growing city. His buildings are comparable to those of Roman or Greek grand antiquity, which
were also often surpassing construction restraints in their time. The U-shape plan of his Guaranty Building
with south facing, white-glazed tile courtyards collected and distributed as much natural light as possible into
the interior spaces, which were divided using partitions of timber, glass and open steel cages.
Fig xiv Fig xv
Fig xiv: Terracotta ornament. Guaranty Building, New York. 1895. Sullivan, Louis.
(<http://nla.gov.au/nla.pic-vn3721245-s9.>, Accessed 12th January 14)
Fig xv: Elevator Doors. Source as above.

70 Szarkowski, John. The Idea of Louis Sullivan. London: Thames & Hudson. 2000. P 13.
71 Roth, Leland M. Understanding Architecture: its elements, history and meaning. East Roseville, NSW: Craftsman House.
1994. P 450.

Art Nouveau gave way to the Art Deco movement appearing in France following World War I. Again a
total art style, Le Corbusier was attributed with the first use of the word Art Deco.72 Owing to its
emergence in the inter-war period, it embraced the rapid industrialization that was transforming culture at
the time.73 People were more adaptable, many social structures were broken or altered, and progress was
the mood of the moment. Lines became cleaner, and forms often more symbolic than literal. The age of
abstract design was coming to the fore, geometric form taking the place of organic motif, following the
trend of the coinciding art movements of cubism, constructivism and futurism. The work of Charles Rennie
Mackintosh was one of the most influential over the emerging Deco style, with his work from the 1900s
proving as an indication of what was to come.
Fig xvi Fig xvii Fig xviii
Fig xvi: House for an Art Lover, competition entry. 1901. Mackintosh, Charles Rennie.
(<http://designmuseum.org/media/item/4377/-1/114_4Lg.jpg>, Accessed 17th January 14).
Fig xvii: Stain glass window. Martin House, New York. 1904. Wright, Frank Lloyd.
(<http://museum.cornell.edu/collections/view/stained-glass-windows-from-martin-
house.html>, Accessed 17th January 14).
Fig xviii: Six-panel screen. Ca. 1922-25. Gray, Eileen. (<http://www.highendweekly.com/2013/03/tete-
tete-with-dr-stephen-kelly-stay.html>, Accessed 17th Janua

72 Benton, Charlotte. Benton, Tim & Ghislaine, Wood. Art Deco: 1910-1939. London: V&A. 2003. P 16.
73 Hillier, Bevis. Art Deco of the 20s and 30s. New York: Schocken Books. 1985. P 12.

Part II

Abstraction
The rational brain is the primary power at mans disposal to translate his yearnings into
semblances of reality.74
We are abstract thinkers. We have used this ability to imagine and create the world around us. We use
language, symbols, and art to experiences in our own minds. This we do by drawing from the wealth of
memories that we acquire over our lives.
Kellerts biophilic elements
The direct experience of nature does occur in buildings and especially in landscapes and
organisms, but more typically the built environment emphasizes the indirect and particularly the
symbolic experience of the natural world.75
In his book Building for Life, Kellert has listed what he sees as the attributes of biophilic design.76 His eight
elements are: (1) Prospect; ability to see distance, (2) refuge; sense of enclosure or shelter, (3) water: indoors
or inside views, (4) biodiversity, (5) sensory variability, (6) biomimicry, (7) sense of playfulness, (8) enticement.
Direct access to nature is to be immersed in it in a forest, by the sea, or being bathed in
unfiltered light and air. One would expect this to evoke the most potent emotional response, however
Kellerts argument is that there are levels of biophilic design that are indirect that is something non-living,
metaphorical or vicarious, but which stimulate a similar sense of emotion as direct access to nature, and are
applicable to indoor space.77
To present this, Kellert refers to the work of Frank Lloyd Wright, predominantly his residential
structures. The organic design features prominent in Wrights work are natural light, natural materials, and
incorporation of the surrounding environment through views. His Prairie-style housing also sits into rather
than onto the landscape where they are sited, owing to the shadows cast by the deep eaves diminishing the
force of the solid, vertical wall.78 All of these elements are familiar in vernacular design traditionally a re-
arrangement of materials present on site or in the vicinity.79 What vernacular architecture achieves is a sense
of belonging in a place, with the outdoors environment literally being what makes the building. Vernacular
buildings have the ability to mature, be repaired or adapt to changing conditions. To Wright any building
should be an elemental, sympathetic feature of the ground, complementary to its nature-environment,
belonging in kinship to the terrain,80 however on the exterior he often uses alien materials such as concrete.
In this case, he relies on careful form and proportion to allow the buildings to nestle into their surroundings
it may be out of place, but it is sympathetic toward its context.

74 Tuan, Yi-Fu. Common psychological structures and responses, in Topophilia: A Study of Environmental Perception,
Attitudes and Values. Engelwood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc., 1974. p.14.
75 Kellert, Stephen R. Building for Life: Designing and Understanding the Human-Nature Connection. Washington: Island
Press, 2005. P 128.

76 Ibid., P 129.
77 Ibid., P 127.
78 Ibid., P 130.
79 Stephens, Dominic. "Chair as Landscape. House as Landscape: A Veracular Chair as Re-Arrangement of a Hedgrow.
A House as Re-Arrangement of a Site." In The Everyday Experience. Irish Museum of Modern Art: Irish
Architecture Foundation, 2013.
80 Wright, Frank Lloyd. Quoted in op. cit., Kellert. P 130.

Fig xix Fig xx
Fig xix: Rosenbaum House. 1939. Wright, Frank Lloyd.

(<http://www.pinterest.com/revisionhome/great-outdoors/>, Accessed 17th January 14).
Fig xx: Fallingwater. 1935. Wright, Frank Lloyd. (<http://www.arquitetonico.ufsc.br/frank-lloyd-wright>,
Accessed 17th January 14).
Wright often used stained glass in his architecture (see fig xvii) The colours, forms and light passing through
such a window creates a rich, varied light similar to that which passes through a tree or plant canopy. This is
an abstract reference to the natural world, but one which actively creates a similar indoor condition to be
experienced by the occupant.
Man as abstract thinker
early twentieth-century modernist art, where it was held that particular property of every art was
to offer an experience unique to its own particular medium, incommunicable through any other
medium.81
Experience of one art form cannot be experienced through another; this was an ongoing idea in the
modernist movement as it emerged, however it implied that architecture could not be experienced through
words, art not through photography, nor literature through the image.82 There is logic in this, and a
conscience toward the genius of the artist, but if it is the case, can nature ever hope to be recreated in
architecture? There must also be a level of acknowledgment for the equal genius of the human mind to fill
in the gaps, taking an abstraction of a reality and with their own creative input, imagine the experience for
itself.83
We have become accustomed to abstract references; they inundate us. The great artists and their
works may be where we trace the cultural values to, but their work filters down into the visual and graphic
world we see every day in the form of trends. As Haute couture manifests on the distant, glamorous
catwalk, and eventually finds its ways to the high street, so too great art sets the trend our advertisements,
illustrations, magazines and other visual media follow. We have been groomed to understand our world in
abstract terms by being consistently exposed to abstract symbols and icons, one of the most enduring being
Harry Becks London Underground Map.

81
Forty, Adrian. Introduction in Words and Buildings: A Vocabulary of Modern Architecture. London: Thames & Hudson,
2000. P 13.
82 Ibid., P 13.
83 Tuan, Yi-Fu. From Cosmos to Landscape. In Topophilia: A Study of Environmental Perception, Attitudes and Values.
Engelwood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc., 1974. P 129.

Fig xxi
Fig xxi: London Underground Map. 1933. Beck, Harry.

(<http://www.tfl.gov.uk/corporate/projectsandschemes/2443.aspx>, Accessed 17th January
14).
An abstraction is anything that seeks to convey the idea through the form of another. There is an absence
of literal depiction. Indirect biophilia demands a level of imaginative input; to join the dots. Often, this is
achieved through associative memory the theoretical model of linking of information in the memory
whereby input of sensory data constitutes a reminder to another piece of information by association84. For
example, a light breeze reminiscent of a walk in the country, dappled sunlight hitting the wall like a forest
floor there is a reliance on individual perception and experience.85 Connection is never stronger felt than
when a memory is triggered consciously or unconsciously and memories are most enduring when
concerning a potent emotional experience.86 It is this function; of being able to visualize the building from a
line drawing, or the scene from an abstract painting, that allows us to experience a similar level of
satisfaction in being exposed to an indirect abstraction of the natural world, as direct access.87 The degree at
which this satisfaction is experienced is a little harder to unveil, as it is so dependent on individual
perception.
Perception; imaginative input
man learns while he sees and what he learns influences what he sees88
This is why we enjoy the arts; they present conditions from which the mind simulates reality, provoking
engagement. Art is not purely entertaining; it presents puzzles for the mind to contend with, although within
a framework that is visually, acoustically or in any other way, sensually elegant. Art evokes contemplation,
confusion or revelation. It challenges perception and reaction. The act of leaving a gap or a degree of
incomplete reality, allows the mind to actively fill it with something of its own.
In this way, abstractions of nature can sometimes hold a greater potential to engage than direct
access. In removing an element of reality, there is left the promise of a world unknown to any other. There
is room for personal input, to get lost in your own fantasy.

84 Anderson, John R. and Bower, Gordon H. Human Associative Memory: A Brief Edition. Hilldale, New Jersey: Lawrence
Erlbaum Associates Publishers. 1980. P 65.
85 Forty, Adrian. Memory in Words and Buildings: A Vocabulary of Modern Architecture. London: Thames & Hudson,
2000. P 208-9.
86 "Neuroanatomy of Memory." In The Oxford Handbook of Memory, edited by Endel Tulving and Fergus I. M. Craik, 478.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. P 137.

87 Hes, D. 2013. Biophilic Design, lecture given in Regenerating Sustainability ABPL90272 at the University of Melbourne,
Parkville, on 10 April 2013.
P 66.

Fig xxii Fig xxiii
Fig xxii: Reflected light & water pool, Frye Museum, Seatle, USA. 1997. Remodlelling.
(<http://www.flickr.com/photos/brewbooks/241316052/in/photostream/>, Accessed 17th
January 14).
Fig xxiii: Suspended Corridor. 2005. Iglesias, Cristina.
(<http://albaforteagorraiz.wordpress.com/antecedentes/>, Accessed 17th January 14).
Visual artist and filmmaker, Niamh OMalley, works with this phenomenon studying the symptoms of
Charles Bonnet syndrome, whereby sufferers are subject to an enlarged blind spot of the eye. What results
is that the brain unconsciously fills in the missing information with hallucinated forms from imagination or
memory. OMalleys work involves manipulating or obscuring portions of film to challenge the perception
and expectation of the viewer.89 Sometimes creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties;90 the
lack of reality bestows on the abstract stimulus just such an absence of certainty. Like a puzzle, an
abstraction demands input from the individual, to be experienced by no one else but that individual.
Culturally, we desire and respond to our environments in entirely different ways. For example in
general terms; the Japanese are accustomed to limited space, and are therefore less stressed by confined
arrangements and have a higher tolerance for crowding. They also tend to furnish their rooms in a different
manner, placing furniture in the center of a space, and so can find those with furniture located along the
walls larger than those accustomed to the same arrangement. 91 Memory, and experience alters perception;
we can measure with a tape whether or not a man can reach something, but we must apply an entirely
different set of standards to judge the validity of an individuals feeling of being cramped.92 Experience is so
inherently connected with individual to their own past experiences that it is almost impossible to evoke
the same emotional reaction to a provocation in any two people. There are, however, frameworks that can
accommodate assumptions to establish some similarities, such as culture, as no matter how hard man tries
it is impossible for him to divest from his own culture93
In this way, biophilia cannot present a set framework of design principles which must be adhered
to, nor can it answer the degree of negative impact that their absence will incur, but biophilia may offer a
guide that can be adopted and applied to the specific situation in question. In a recent exhibition called The
Everyday Experience, one contributor Ciaran OGaora wrote;
The home youre born into always has a particular fascination. It informs the instinctive feelings
you have for scale, light, texture, form, flow of spacethese measures are carried with you
through life and new spaces are viewed through the lens of what youve already experienced as a
child.94
OGaoras own work involved designing miniature houses that connect scale, memory, emotion and
experience. It is important that when the designer moves into the realm of designing for individual
experience that they avoid the trap of designing for everyone resulting in designing for no one. There are,
however, instinctive stimuli we as the general population can be presumed to respond to, its just a case of
establishing what these are.

89 OMalley, Niamh. US Thirteen. Lecture, Monday Market series. Richview, University College Dublin on 7th October
2013.
90 Fromm, Erich. "The Creative Attitude", in Harold H. Anderson (ed.), Creativity and Its Cultivation, New York, Harper &
Brothers, 1959, pp. 44-54. P 53.
91 Hall, Edward, T. The Hidden Dimension : Man's Use of Space in Public and Private. London: The Bodley Head Ltd, 1966,
P 52.
92 Ibid., P 52.
93 Ibid., P 177.
94 OGaora, Ciaran. In The Everyday Experience. Irish Museum of Modern Art. October 2013.

Sherry Turkle, a psychologist and social scientist, conducted a series of experiments concerning artificial
versus human voice recognition.95 She discovered that the level of reality necessary in the artificial voice to
obtain the same level of emotional response in a human was startlingly low. The abstracted voice needed
only a small level of pitch fluctuation to replicate human speech, and when coupled with facial expression
and movement mirroring in basic toys, the emotional response was almost indeterminable between that
evoked by a human voice and that of an artificial device. She described these instinctive stimuli as Darwinian
buttons; genetically programmed into us to recognize and respond to other living creatures like us.96
This too can be applicable to relationship to nature, and is evident in Kellerts design
principles (see Kellerts biophilic elements).97 His attributes identify what are these so-called Darwinian
buttons particular stimuli associated with life-like conditions. They take advantage of the ability to trick the
unconscious mind into believing artificial conditions are in fact derived from natural sources.

95 Turkle, Sherry, speaking in, Moore, Stefans "Mysteries of the Human Voice." 52 mins. Australia: National Geographic,
2013.
96 Ibid., Turkle.
Press, 2005. P 127.

Scale
Throughout the history of the built environment, many architects have studied and based design principle
around the human form.98 This makes sense, as humans are the client for which architecture is intended. As
the mathematician discusses elegance of a solution, so the architect discusses proportion.99
Fig xxiv Fig xxv
Fig xxiv: Vitruvian Man. 1492. Da Vinci, Leonardo. <http://witcombe.sbc.edu/davincicode/leonardo-

vitruvian-man.html> Accessed 17th Dec. 2013.
Fig xxv: Le Modulor 1949. Le Corbusier. <http://www.andriesvanonck.com/ergonomy.html>
Accessed 17th Dec. 2013.
The original model for discussing beauty in architecture derives from Platos account of the natural world
being governed by geometry or numerical relations100. The perfection strived toward in the regulation of
concinnitus aims to translate beauty in the minute adjustment of proportion. Da Vincis Vitruvian Man is
probably the most universally recognizable drawing of human harmony through proportion, but similar
aspirations are witnessed in Corbusiers fascination in the idea of human scale, evident in his many drawings
exploring the body, none as much as his Modulator Man.
Domesticated man
We may not be used to thinking of ourselves in this way, but we are animals. We may feel more flesh and
bone when we are sick, or exercising or using our bodies, but on the whole, we too often feel that our
bodies are just means of transporting our heads!101 As I previously discussed, Western man has set himself
apart from nature, and therefore, from the rest of the animal world,102 and as a tamed being, like other
domesticated animals, we are capable of squeezing greater numbers into a given area, as is occurring in our
cities.103 In the so-called higher mammals, this can be maintained, as long as they feel safe and aggression is
under control. If stress begins to rise, so too does fear, and the primitive survival instincts of the brain take
hold. In this instance, there needs to be a release.
In Corbusiers Unit d'habitation, the ceiling level of these comparably slender apartments was
taken down to an uncommonly low height of just above two meters for much of their floor plan. This
confinement should surely constitute an unpleasant living condition, however it did not, with these
apartments being highly acclaimed and desired. The reason for this is that the compressed space is
juxtaposed against an entirely glazed wall providing an uninhibited view to the horizon (in the case of the
bedrooms), or a portion of double-height space (in the case of the living areas). What this provided was the
necessary release of space intensified by the compressed zone, and proved that a small portion of
generosity can allow greater confinement overall.104 This highly choreographed arrangement also serves to
intensify the occupiers relationship with the view, awarding it a more predominant role in the everyday life

98 Forty, Adrian. Nature in Words and Buildings: A Vocabulary of Modern Architecture. London: Thames & Hudson, 2000.
P 221.
100 Forty, Op. cit., P 220.
101 Robinson, Ken. Ken Robinson: How schools kill creativity 2006. TED Talks.
102 Hall, Op. cit., P 184.
P 186.
104 Janson, Alban. Krohn, Carsten and Grunwald, Anja. Le Corbusier: Unit d'habitation, Marseille. Stuttgart, London: Axel
Menges. 2007. P 31.

of the apartment. The overall effect resonates with Kellerts biophilic design principles, namely; prospect, and
sensory variability.105
In contrast to this, the staff canteen in Michael Scotts Busaras features a different kind of release.
Here, on the seventh floor in Dublin a city of little high-rise development there is a rarely enjoyed view.
For the staff, however, the wonder must soon become banal, and most choose to spend their breaks not
by the south-facing floor to ceiling windows, but on the opposite side of the room in an area where the
ceiling drops to being less than door-height. This narrow zone provides a spatial intimacy the staff does not
get to enjoy in the office environment, offering instead a sense of sheltered security at a more human scale,
drawing on Kellerts biophilic attribute, refuge, as well as sense of playfulness, and enticement.106
Fig xxvi Fig xxvii
Fig xxvi: Le Corbusiers, Unit d'Habitation. High-density housing. Marseille, France. 1945.
(<http://www.extraextra.org/Review_Art_Le_Corbusier_09.html> Accessed 15th Dec
2013.)
Fig xxvii: Busaras staff canteen. 1953. Scott, Michael.
(<http://farm7.staticflickr.com/6155/6230182262_2e257c41cb_z.jpg> Accessed 10th January
2014)
Fig xxviii Fig xxix
Fig xxviii: Boyd, Robin. Walsh St House. Melbourne, Australia. 1958.

<http://www.beciorpin.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/walsh_st_2.jpg> Accessed
27th Oct. 2013.
Fig xxix: Gray, Eileen. E-1027. Cote d'Azur, France. 1929.
<https://www.domusweb.it/content/dam/domusweb/en/art/2010/12/10/conversation-
with-kasper-akh-j/big_288650_2033_08-p.81.book_2_UPD1.jpg> Accessed 2nd Jan 2014.
The view in Boyds house has a similar effect to that of the Unit d'Habitation apartments. Designed to only
be experienced through the banal act of sitting on the couch, does this serve in a way to bring these distant

Press, 2005. P 128.
106 Ibid., P 128.

mountains to an almost tangible level. It certainly encourages the beholder to see them for longer, as they
have already assumed a position of rest. The resultant experience warps perception of distance and in fact
allows a distant landscape to have a presence in this domestic space. If one wished to get closer, or
experience the air as well as view from the balcony, the view would not be visible. This game of withholding
served to intensify the experience of only one sense at a time; the view only to be experienced from the
indoor environment, and the open air only in a covered condition.
Each are examples of choreographed experience, not simple observation or presentation, and
each are designed with the scale of human body in mind, however it was a conceited scaling in Corbs case,
as he designed the space to the scale of the French man. He was accused of sexism in his dimensioning of
the space! Looking at Eileen Greys e1027, she designed in a similar fashion, but instead to her own slight
statures scale. She placed herself at the centre of the design and arranged the view to the horizon to be
visible at her eye level. As a personal home, this was slightly more acceptable than Corbs high-density
housing project.
Gray and Corbusier had very different views regarding designing for the human, despite their
mutual respect and familiarity. In response to Corbusiers comment that the house being a machine to live
in, Gray contradicted this, saying It is the shell of manhis extension, his release, his spiritual emanation."107
Her design was very much about the scale of the human body, and the scale of use. She emphasized
minimum space and maximum comfort. She sought to enhance the human potential of modern
architecture, overcoming its supposed cold and alienating qualities by reinstating fundamental physical,
psychological and spiritual needs as primary108 To her by designing with the body in mind, the house held
the potential to become an extension of that very body. She focused not only on harmonizing built with the
greater natural environment, but with the one we ourselves are housed in our bodies.
Without intentionally seeking to do so, Corbusier, Scott, Boyd and especially Gray were putting
into practice many biophilic design attributes.109 There may be eight, but not all need to be utilized to create
a space harmonizing with the natural environment. Theres a degree of subjective selection required by the
desidner, as biophilia does not need to overpower their own creative vision.
Extensions; the veils of modern life
Man and his extensions constitute one interrelated system. It is a mistake of the greatest
magnitude to act as though man were one thing and his house or his cities, his technology or his
language were something else.110
Modern life in developed societies has caused us to evolve to be almost entirely dependant on the
conveniences we have come to know. Culture derives from the everyday experience the way we live
and so we have grown to create our own self-assembled culture that is highly reliant on technology and
man-made resources. As such, one cannot think as simply about how to increase connection to the natural
world and living systems without taking the existing culture into account.
Hall argues that we are inherently linked to our culture it is part of our very being, drives our
instinctive responses, and veils all our actions in its hidden agenda.111 It arises from the whole of what we
know around us; our environment, our technology, our relationships and movements. Most of culture
remains hidden beyond the realm of consciousness. We are a product of our nurture, as well as our nature;
this culture is not fixed, but an ever-morphing aspect of our being. You learn something new every day; a
familiar saying, but one that is often not considered beyond the accomplishment of learning a new fact or
skill. Every new bit of technology, every new convenience that yields favour in frequent use, however small,
gains a place in our culture.
We are at the point it is almost impossible to envisage removing ourselves from the culture of
convenience we have made for ourselves, and it is worth questioning when weve goie too far. Fromm
viewed these conveniences as hindrances to the elevation of mankind, implying that we are becoming

107 Gray, quoted in Constant, Caroline. Eileen Gray. London: Phaidon Press Ltd. 2000. P 117.
108 Ibid., P 73.
Press, 2005. P 128.

P 188.
111 Hall, Edward, T. Hidden Culture. In Beyond Culture. P 57.

complacent and idle as a result of our own past innovation.112 Thoreaus book Walden, well known in our
environmentally aware age, is an advocate of simple living and natural surroundings. He shares the view that
the extensions weve encapsulated ourselves in inhibit the higher mental functions weve evolved to be
capable of.113
The natural world is not only physically competing against the extensions of modern life, but must
also fight to gain our attention. If its not consciously considered in the environments that we frequent, we
run the risk of loosing a strong relationship with it as a society as a whole the very scale of our engagement
will greatly diminish.

112 Thoreau, Henry David. Economy in, Walden: a Place in the Woods. Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1854. P 269.

Conclusion
Human reliance on nature for the basic elements for life may all be but a distant memory in the developed
world, but our inherent fascination and need to connect with it remains ever-present. Viewing art and
literature as a product and conveyer of cultural view, one can clearly trace our altering perception of the
natural world. The arrival of modernist movements saw abstraction in language and attitude toward design
come to the fore across the creative disciplines.114 There was a progressive and conscious effort to distil
form down to its very essence; this too can be said of our attitude to nature; in architecture, decoration and
ornament were replaced by the clean line and simple plan. Credit was duly given to the human minds
capacity to simulate reality from basic abstraction.115 The act of relating to nature moved away from direct
access to the natural world, and into the realm of abstract reference.
Man set himself aside from the natural world through technology; his extensions.116 These
extensions have become so embodied in our culture that we can no longer be thought of as separate from
them, they formulate the constant lens through which we perceive the world around us. The pace of
technological advances is fixed, but it is not to be viewed as a negative direction, as our advances are a
celebration of the very innovation and capacity to create biophilia seeks to enhance. It may be difficult to
ignore the many new extensions becoming increasingly common in society as a whole, and the sum of which
undoubtedly contribute to the stressful disconnectedness modern life inflicts on many individuals, but I
conclude that we must execute a degree of will power to limit our own personal reliance on them.
In examining the morphology of our representations of nature, this paper undertook to reveal the
potency of abstractions relative to nature itself, and if they possess greater potential to penetrate the veil of
extensions weve encased ourselves in. In the absence of direct access, abstracted nature certainly has huge
potential for positive impact not decorative visual pattern, but sensual stimuli reminiscent off nature herself.
There is a careful choreography required to create successful biophilic space, which has been absent in
other green movements.
Fromm notes that the point at which we became human as opposed to animal was this very
moment that instinctive thought gave way to what he calls his awareness.117 However, engagement with
abstraction leads us to relapse back to a more instinctive way of thought. The abstract image relies on quick
response, and to a degree, one that is universal and crosses cultural perceptions.118 Many of the great and
revered architects of our time were working in this realm of abstraction and nature, even if it was not a
central theme to their works legacy. For any movement to remain prevalent, for progress to be achieved, it
must retain the favour and attention of the masses, therefore our discussion of nature and the natural
environment needs to join the design platform for discussion on a more equal and accessible level not as
optional new-age technology, but as desirable, simple and above all beneficial references. The chore of
nature in design needs to be forgotten, the delight reinstated.

114 Forty, Adrian. Words and Buildings: A Vocabulary of Modern Architecture. London: Thames & Hudson, 2000. p.23.
115 Tuan, Yi-Fu. Topophilia: A Study of Environmental Perception, Attitudes and Values. Engelwood Cliffs, New Jersey:
Prentice-Hall Inc., 1974. p.13.
p.188.


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Appendix
A1 A walk through a Biophilic house

Boyd House II, Melbourne, Australia.1958. Boyd, Robin.
Fig : Image of Boyd House II, by Melanie OBrien
Robin Boyds Walsh St House, dating to1958, offers obvious connection with nature through the large open-air
courtyard splitting the home in two, but it also includes many more of the attributes Kellert outlines in his work. Basic
environmental features attributed to biophilic design by Kellert include water and colour. Entry to Walsh St House is
through a bright red door in an otherwise plain, unremarkably woven fence. The human eye is naturally drawn to bright
colour; in our primitive past it would often denote an area of fertility, growth, and therefore, food.
Walking though this, one passes over an overgrown pond, crosses a boardwalk with more give than one is
used to is then presented with an immense wall dappled in sunlight which diffuses through the uncharacteristically
large tree on the street front. Of course this is an attractive setup for most people, but it is designed to put one at ease
as they leave the suburban streetscape for the hidden world within. In one of the most prestigious addresses in the City
of Melbourne, surrounded by dense development, there exists an oasis of escape and contentment, achieved by clever
blocking of what one doesnt want to see, and opening what one desires to experience. On entry to the main space of
the house, the master bedroom, a secret view to the distant mountains is only revealed if one is lucky enough to pause
and be invited to sit down on the salubrious velvet couch.
The idea of scales of nature; from wilderness, to poetic or abstract is an important one in biophilia. In the
case of Walsh Street, Boyd was a talented architect, with an opportunistic site, designing to his own taste. There is a
clever play of when and where to connect to the greater landscape, and when to retreat to the controlled internal
courtyard, which is both logical and fundamental to the function of the house.
As a man from a family of successful painters, Boyd was familiar with art, and was adamant that architecture
occupied the same realm of high distinction. The injection of vibrant colour through artworks into an otherwise
subdued colour palette was of equal importance to the choice of deep shades of timber, warm copper fixings and
vibrant green canopy. To Boyd, the complexity of space relied on combining decorative, built and natural elements as
one entity to be experienced.
This reflects in Kellerts idea that any reference to the natural environment has an effect on human emotion,
the larger the scale the more potent or enduring the impression, such as a brick relief wall offering an abstract pattern
of light and shadow mimicking the dappled light through a forest canopy, or light reflected from water creating a
dynamic organic pattern.119

119Heerwagen, Judith H. and Gregory, Bert. Biophilia and Sensory Aesthetics in Biophilic Design: The Theory, Science
and Practice of Bringing Buildings to Life. Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons Ltd, 2008. p 227-241.

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Biophilia:

Perception of the Environment

Supervisor: Elizabeth Shotton

Master of Architecture Programme

The Broken water-jar

Blue suns, green whirlwinds,

But tell me, burnt earth, is there no water?

The rain awakens...

We must sleep with open eyes,

[Octavio Paz, 1955]

Biophilia: Perception of the Environment

Fig i: 1 St Marys Lane, Dublin. 1964. Robin Walker.

nothing can come of nothing

What's in a name? That which we call a rose

Theory needs a term

nothing comes harder than original thought12

Biophilia, a new brand?

The acknowledgement of human habitat

Fig ii: Clerical workers in the Pentagon. 1950. (<http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21878739>

The roots of Biophilia

Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd., 1947. P 366.

Prentice-Hall Inc., 1974. P14.

Environmental sensuality, bias toward the visual

(2004): 315-40. P 315

The Riverside Press, 1950. P 223.

Press, 1950. P 16.

Humanitys identity in a changing world

Routeledge & Kegan Paul Ltd., 1947. P 39.

Fig iii Fig iv

Art as lineage of a fluctuating relationship

Fig. v: The Garden of Earthly Delights. Bosch, Hieronymus,1480-1505.

Fig vii Fig viii Fig ix

Fig vii: Gardens of Versailles. 1662-1700. Le Ntre, Andr. (<http://www.jardineriaramal.es/blog-

Reverberations from the great movements

220-39. London: Thames & Hudson, 2000. p. 227.

Fig x Fig xi Fig xii Fig xiii

Fig x: Staircase. Tassel House, Brussels. 1893-94. Horta, Victor.

Fig xiv Fig xv

Fig xvi Fig xvii Fig xviii

Kellerts biophilic elements

Press, 2005. P 128.

Fig xix Fig xx

Fig xix: Rosenbaum House. 1939. Wright, Frank Lloyd.

Man as abstract thinker

Fig xxi: London Underground Map. 1933. Beck, Harry.

Perception; imaginative input

Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. P 137.

Fig xxii Fig xxiii

Fig xxiv Fig xxv

Fig xxiv: Vitruvian Man. 1492. Da Vinci, Leonardo. <http://witcombe.sbc.edu/davincicode/leonardo-

Fig xxvi Fig xxvii

Fig xxviii Fig xxix

Fig xxviii: Boyd, Robin. Walsh St House. Melbourne, Australia. 1958.

Extensions; the veils of modern life

Press, 2005. P 128.

Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd., 1947. P 40.

A1 A walk through a Biophilic house

Fig : Image of Boyd House II, by Melanie OBrien

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What's in a name? That which we call a rose