Multisensory Landscape Design

A Designer’s Guide for Seeing

Daniel Roehr

www.routledge.com
 Cover image: Daniel Roehr

First published 2022

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© 2022 Daniel Roehr

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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Roehr, Daniel, author.

Title: Multisensory landscape design : a designer’s guide for seeing / Daniel Roehr.

Description: New York, NY : Routledge, 2022. | Includes bibliographical references and index. |

Identifiers: LCCN 2021053865 (print) | LCCN 2021053866 (ebook) | ISBN 9781138586796

(hardback) | ISBN 9781138586802 (paperback) | ISBN 9780429504389 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Landscape design. | Senses and sensation. | Intersensory effects. | Design--Human
factors.

Classification: LCC SB472.45 R66 2022 (print) | LCC SB472.45 (ebook) | DDC 712--dc23/
eng/20211216

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021053865

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021053866

ISBN: 9781138586796 (hbk)

ISBN: 9781138586802 (pbk)
ISBN: 9780429504389 (ebk)

DOI: 10.4324/9780429504389

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by Paratype

Publisher’s Note
This book has been prepared from camera-ready copy provided by the author.

ii
 For Cornelia Hahn Oberlander,
who taught us to be persistent in our learning,
to be passionate about every endeavour we take on,
to listen with kindness and be polite,
and to remain patient and persevere,
no matter the odds.

iii
 Acknowledgments
A book is always a creation of many people. Foremost, I would like to wholeheartedly
thank Michelle Gagnon-Creeley, without whom this book would not exist. It began with a
directed study she did with me at UBC about hand sketching, which inspired the creation of
a seminar on seeing not only through hand sketching but using all five senses. Michelle was
instrumental in setting up the seminar, which culminated in writing this book, and supported
it all the way as contributing author, editor, graphic designer, and motivator.

Second, I would like to thank the Seeing Environment classes of 2018 and 2020 for trying
out the seminar exercises and the many who allowed their drawings to be used as examples
for Chapter 4. I would especially like to thank the following students for their images: Jenna
Ratzlaff, Valia Puente, Mingjia Chen, Kemeng Gao, Samantha Hart, Marissa Campbell,
Fabian Lobmueller, Yaying Zhou, Wenwen Zhuang, Kathryn Pierre, Berend Kessler, Yette
Gram, Vicky Cen, Jennifer Reid, Josh Fender, Jonathan Behnke, Jacob Darowski, and Doug
Craig.

I would also like to thank Neda Rhoonia for creating the garden maps in Chapter 3,
and Feiyu Wei for her research and translations on multisensorial gardens in China. A big
thank you to Jordon Lypkie, Marissa Campbell, and Duncan Chambers for their insightful
comments and rigorous edits of the book manuscript.

And finally, my partner Jane Green, who also kindly supported me in writing the book.

v
 Contributors
Daniel Roehr, MBCSLA, CSLA, AKB. Author. Roehr is an Associate Professor at
the University of British Columbia School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture in
Vancouver, Canada. He is a registered landscape architect in British Columbia and Berlin as
well as a horticulturalist. Daniel has earned a Higher National Diploma (HND) in Horticulture
and Landscape Technology from Askham Bryan College (York, England) and a BA (Hons) in
Landscape Architecture from Heriot-Watt University / Edinburgh College of Art (Edinburgh,
Scotland).

He is the founder and director of greenskinslab at UBC. For nearly three decades, his research
has focused on international living roof design, construction, and low impact development
(LID) as part of holistic stormwater management. This work is documented in his co-authored
book Living Roofs in Integrated Urban Water Systems (Routledge 2015). Since 2013, he has
been exploring how to make the concepts of LID accessible and acceptable to the public
through animated hand drawn videos.

In recent years Daniel’s research has expanded into how to teach visual literacy and
multisensorial literacy to students accustomed to using computers. Roehr is also interested in
the role of architectural hand drawing as a research tool to see the environment and to guide
design iterations, and he shares his drawings on Instagram.

He has practiced extensively in Europe, North America, and Asia. From 1995 to 2000,
he was project architect of the ground-breaking water sensitive living roof design of the
Daimler-Chrysler Green Roof Project, Potsdamer Platz, Berlin, Germany. In 2013 he was
a UBC Sustainability Research Fellow and was selected as a team member to compete in
designing the Canadian National Holocaust Memorial in Ottawa. In 2016 he received the
Killam Teaching Prize from UBC.

https://blogs.ubc.ca/drawingsdanielroehr/
https://www.instagram.com/danielroehrdrawings/

Michelle Gagnon-Creeley, Contributing Author, Research and Graphics. Gagnon-

Creeley is a landscape designer, writer, and artist based in Vancouver. She holds a
master’s degree in landscape architecture from the University of British Columbia, and a
bachelor’s degree in urban planning from Concordia University. Gagnon-Creeley’s work
critically examines landscape architecture with regard to mindfulness, design as storytelling,
decolonization, Indigenous sovereignty, and racial justice.

vii
viii
 Contents

Preface x

Chapter 1 1
From Visual to Multisensorial Literacy

Chapter 2 17
Multisensorial Design Thinking

Chapter 3 59
Sensewalks

Chapter 4 101
Becoming Multisensorial

Chapter 5 209
Teaching Multisensorial Literacy

Chapter 6 227
Conclusion

Glossary 233

Index 237

ix
 0.1
A landscape drawn by the
author at the age of 13.

x
 Preface
This is a textbook for design students, professionals, and educators that aims to teach visual
literacy using the five senses: touch, sound, taste, smell, and sight. This book puts forward
a plea for a shift in design education—design educators must begin to teach and practice
multisensorial literacy and place-based mindfulness. It is essential that design curricula help
establish designers who are capable of immersing in, and deeply understanding the spaces
that they are designing.

Since childhood, art has been my second oxygen. Many of my ancestors were artists,
reaching back generations. My father was an artist, and my mother was an art dealer. Art,
and especially drawing, has been my anchor in life. Drawing was my language as a child.
I did not really like realistic drawing at the time; I would copy the Dada artists and Bauhaus
pupils that my mother exhibited. Realistic drawing meant rules and precise observation—I
wanted to express how I felt or what I experienced. I was always a rebel, creating my own
drawing methods and expressive styles. This gave me the ability to draw and experiment
without apprehension from early on in life. When I was a child, my mother explained to
me that before Picasso drew abstractly, he was trained to draw realistically. This had an
impression on me. Later, while studying to become a landscape architect, I learned how to
excel in drawing from my first-year lecturer, William “Bill” Tucker. Bill, a wonderfully gifted
drawer, was my most influential mentor and one of my dearest friends until his sudden early
death. His teaching also initiated my desire to follow in his footsteps to become a teacher
myself.

Along with being an artist, my father also trained as an art teacher. He never praised my
work—he knew that the work was above average for a five-year-old, but always responded
with “do another one,” encouraging me to continue to get better and learn to critique my
own work. Drawing was a way to express ideas and thoughts just for myself; it was like my
own visual secret language. In comparison with the strict regurgitative learning in Bavarian
primary school, I could express my ideas through my own means of communication. This
ability has guided me throughout my professional and academic career. I realized early
on that I was a visual learner. I could remember whole cities and landscapes spatially, but
I could not yet graphically represent them, as I had not learned techniques like perspectival
drawing. Learning the English vocabulary was much harder for me. Many children do not
know that they might be stronger visual learners, especially as typical Western pedagogy
focuses on the repetition of facts, formulas, and text. Both skills are important, but often art
is not seen as being on a par with math, science, and technology. After primary school,
art is seen as an elective subject in many schools. The often-suppressed treatment of art in
high school can have the negative impact of school children being less visually literate upon
graduating compared to schools where art is seen as equal to the other subjects taught.
Many students, especially coming from other undergraduate disciplines in the sciences, may
feel under-equipped or incapable of producing visual material in professional graduate
design programs.

xi
 0.2
A landscape drawn by the
author at the age of 15.

xii
 After secondary school I spent time training to be a gardener. It was during this time that one
of my instructors noted a plan I had drawn for a garden bed and encouraged me to study
landscape architecture—a profession I had heard of from my mother when digging a pond
in our community courtyard garden at the age of 12. It was the content of my drawing which
inspired the horticulture teacher to initiate my journey to become a landscape architect, but
this experience also encouraged me to further develop my abstract drawing. Many drawing
phases followed, but the most influential was during my three-year working period in Tokyo,
Japan. Here I relied on drawing to communicate my ideas, making up for the gaps in my
spoken Japanese. I devised a very fast sketch language and realized the immense power
that drawing can hold as an international language and design thinking tool. Since this
experience in the early 1990s I have kept all my sketches and archived them to document
my learning process. I have used them in my lectures, and in March 2019 I launched @
danielroehrdrawings on Instagram, and Off Screen Studio, a blog discussing my drawings.
These tools show intentionally unedited drawings to give viewers, and especially students,
an honest view into learning to draw. It is a skill-developing process, which is imperfect by
nature. I also use these tools to demonstrate the role that drawing plays in design thinking
and processes.

Computer technology in the last century has had profound effects on society and has
shifted the way that humans think and function. In the context of landscape architecture and
architecture, technology has caused a major shift in the way that designers analyze and
conceptualize—hand drawing no longer plays the same role that it once did in a student’s
design process. While technological knowledge is important to foster in design pedagogy,
it is also essential to strike a balance between the computer and the hand. Students should
also be learning critical thinking, communication, collaboration, and creativity. Visual literacy
can embrace these four skills in design teaching. This book proposes a framework of
observation tools, design strategies, and exercises for how visual literacy could be inserted
into contemporary design pedagogy.

The book suggests expanding on existing theories about developing visual literacy to include
the five main senses, referring to this practice as multisensorial literacy. It encourages a new
method of design that allows for place-based mindfulness with consideration of all of the
senses and provides examples of how multisensorial thinking can create more inclusive
designs. The book also delves into each of the five senses and their relevance to design,
providing exercises to encourage seeing and observation. The book is divided into six
chapters— each beginning with theory and ending with tangible exercises and examples
that can be practiced. Each chapter has recommended readings that were inspirational
throughout the writing of the book and could be enriching to those looking to delve deeper
into visual and multisensorial literacy. The proposed exercises can either be done by hand
drawing, digital drawing, or a combination of techniques and media. The book concludes
with a list of recommendations for integrating multisensorial teaching in design education and
provides suggestions for future research. It is hoped that this book will be a good resource
for students, teachers, and readers interested in multisensorial design. Thank you for taking the
time to embark on this journey of discovery.

xiii
 Chapter 1
From Visual to Multisensorial Literacy

1
2
 A Redefinition of Seeing
The ways one moves and interacts in space are inherent considerations in spatial design.
When first learning about spatial design, it is imperative that students begin to understand the
spatial experience. Visual literacy and multisensorial literacy are key to deeply understanding
spatial design, and the advent of digital technology in design disciplines has led to a de-
emphasis in the teaching of these skills in current design pedagogy. Technology has been
immensely powerful in the ways that designers can analyze and represent the world, but
it has also arguably numbed us from using our bodies and senses to design. While we
recognize the importance of digital technology to designers today, we are calling for new
and seasoned designers to learn to be physically present again—to let our bodies be the
recording devices. We are also calling for a renewed definition of seeing, one which
encompasses all of the senses—not just the visual.

Why is it that we have become singularly focused on the visual? Sight has dominated
the hierarchy of the senses in Western thought since ancient Greece, where philosophers
elevated it as the highest sense. Greek architecture was designed for the “pleasure of the eye”
(Pallasmaa, 2005, p. 26). This train of thought continued throughout the Renaissance, when
the five senses were ranked, with vision being the paramount sense and touch considered
of “least importance” (Pallasmaa, 2005, p. 15). The invention of linear perspective drawing
during the Renaissance made the eye the “center point of the perceptual world” (Pallasmaa,
2005, p. 16). Prior to the Renaissance, the architect was heavily involved in a project from
its conception to its construction. This practice shifted during this period, when a separation
was made possible between the drawing and the construction, allowing “for more abstract
thought and experimentation, as clearly risks are straightforward on paper” (Biddulph, 2014,
p. 282). The constructed visual representation of art and architecture during the Renaissance
enforced the dominance of sight over the other senses. The observer was viewing intricately
constructed images, but not feeling them—there was no reference to, or space for, the other
senses. We are still heavily influenced by the eye today—as our entire world is essentially
mediated by screens—in advertisements, maps, and the printed word. We are completely
immersed in the visual. Our other senses continue to play a more subconscious and inhibited
role in the Western world, with some exceptions.

4
 1.1
Gestural drawings, drawn by
the author, 2019

5
 A child first learns to “see” through touch before using their eyes, oftentimes grabbing and
placing a new object in their mouth to experience how it feels. They learn to “see” visual
images later on, and later still can begin to synthesize and express these sensory feelings.
The art critic John Berger wrote “seeing comes before words, the child recognizes before
it can speak” (1972, p. 7). Our bodies are vessels that hold immense power to perceive
and engage with the world in a myriad of ways. They have the capacity to physically store
emotions and memories, and vividly connect us to space through many senses if we are
mindful enough to allow for it. It is for these reasons that seeing should be re-framed as
a multisensorial experience. Our bodies should be treated as the first recording device of
our design process. The architect Juhani Pallasmaa wrote “every touching experience of
architecture is multi-sensory; qualities of space, matter and scale are measured equally by
the eye, ear, nose, skin, tongue, skeleton and muscle” (2005, p. 41). A well-designed space
will engage with all of the senses—but how can we do that when we are taught only to see
with our eyes?

After the multisensorial experience comes perception, which is the conscious outcome
of this experience. Many designers, scientists, and scholars have written on seeing and
perception, and it becomes apparent that it is not the act of sight alone which makes us
physically perceive the world, but a holistic multisensorial process. In Christopher Tilley and
Wayne Bennett’s book Body and Image, the authors note how perception “is a recording of
sensations brought about by objects that are external to the mind” (2008, p. 22). Perception
also has an element of memory and emotion to it—as our bodies engage with a space, our
minds are recalling memories and sensations (Tilley & Bennett, 2008, p. 22; Swailes, 2016,
p. 23). All acts of perception are deeply personal, as they involve our corporeal experience.
With our perceptions and memories come emotions (Swailes, 2016, p. 34). For example, the
experience of certain smells on a site can affect us emotionally, recalling a past memory of
the same smell during a happy or sad time.

Thus, seeing is not only the sight of the visual image, or a “retinal journey” as Pallasmaa
describes it (2005, p. 12). Seeing is a corporeal, multisensorial experience that embodies
the sensation of the present environment, combined with memories of previously experienced
sounds, smells, touch, tastes, and visuals. Seeing is a complex and holistic bodily experience
and should be acknowledged as such in design practice and education.

6
 1.2
Memory drawing of the
Okanagan Valley, Canada,
drawn by the author, 2019

7
 The Importance of Seeing for Designers
Seeing the environment and understanding our perceptions of it are important in the design
process. It is the foundation of designing, and it can be learned and practiced. But as
suggested above, the visual experience should not be the only consideration. All five senses
should create a holistic multisensorial experience and process of perception for designing.

Juhani Pallasmaa has been an advocate for understanding multisensorial perception

in teaching and practicing architectural design throughout his extensive professional and
academic career. He recognizes that as designers our body and mind are at the forefront
of how we design— our senses piece together a framework to understand the world. Our
relationship with the world cannot be removed from how we design spaces. Good design
“integrates physical and mental structures” (Pallasmaa, 2015, p. 12). It is important for us
as designers to recognize that our bodies, and in particular our senses, are recording
mechanisms that can help guide us as we absorb and create. Therefore, it is important that
educators develop more opportunities to practice this mindfulness in design education.

Doing fieldwork has not only been on the decline in design, but also in other disciplines
such as archeology and anthropology “due to [expanded possibilities for] desk work and
remotely gathered and interpreted information” (Swailes, 2016, p. 24). At the time of writing
this book, during a global pandemic, this dynamic has increasingly become the norm.
Photography and video have become the visual observation and recording tools in the field
for landscape architecture, architecture, and urban design, “shifting the field emphasis from
analytical sketching to visual survey” (Swailes, 2016, p. 24). What is missing is the bodily
experience; the conscious engagement of the five senses. Being in the field initiates a wider
range of sensations apart from visuals, and “a multisensorial experience informs perception”
(Swailes, 2016, p. 34).

Site immersion consciously uses all the senses to engage deeply with a site. This could include
spending extensive periods of time observing and listening to the sounds of different birds
to determine if the site is ecologically healthy, or analyzing the smells of a specific area and
their source to determine if the site is pleasant to use. Remote observation often misses out on
the personal perception and emotional interpretation of a site. Field experience and notation
(visual notes diagrammed or drawn, written, photographed, or sound and video recorded)
initiates a deliberate thinking process on site and when processing recorded information
at the desk (Swailes, 2016, p. 37). Site immersion in the environment, writes Swailes, “is
inevitably accompanied by factors we cannot predict, and it is this engagement with chance,
as well as degrees of control, that makes fieldwork a good proxy for the lived landscape
experience of others” (Swailes, 2016, p. 35). Site immersion is multisensorial and initiates
unforeseen sensations, experiences, and emotions, leading to a holistic site understanding.

Visiting a project site and its context regularly before and during the design process is
important; with every visit new experiences, sensations, and conditions will be discovered.
Those discoveries might change the initial perception of the site and alter the problem-solving
strategies during the design process. Site immersion is part of the design process—allowing
for early design thoughts to form immediately or be picked up later. Chapter 5 describes in
detail why this is important when teaching design studios.

8
 Teaching Seeing in Today’s Context
When learning to design for the environment, students need to gradually understand the
spatial experience—how to move through, interact with, and read space—from small to large
scale. The ability to read space is paramount in early design education. In contemporary
design pedagogy, we teach this skill through visual literacy, where students are taught to see
the world around them and to understand, analyze, and interpret these observations visually.
The visual meaning is normally recorded by referential and analytical annotated sketches
and drawings (see Chapter 3), diagrams, collages, and cardboard models. However, in the
packed syllabi of design programs today, multisensorial literacy—especially through hand
drawing, is on the decline.

This book suggests an all-senses, inclusive, pedagogical point of view acknowledging that
sight has historically been the main sensory focus in design teaching. Past research and
publications on visual literacy in design focus mainly on referring to what we see before us,
recording it through drawing and visual note taking. Designers have established definitions
for visual, but not for multisensorial literacy. In Visual Notes for Architects and Designers,
Norman Crowe and Paul Laseau view visual literacy as both “visual acuity and visual
expression” where “visual acuity is an intense ability to see information or multiple messages
in one’s environment with clarity and accuracy” and “visual expression is the ability to initiate
visual messages” (2012, p. 7). The ability to see information or multiple messages includes
hearing, tasting, smelling, and touching, but this has not explicitly been taught in design
education nor has it been addressed in their book. Catherine Dee’s influential Form and
Fabric in Landscape Architecture is one of the first books in landscape architecture which
expands its focus beyond sight alone. Dee acknowledges what others take for granted;
that “we tend to underestimate the strength of influences of other senses on our experience
of landscape” (Dee, 2001, p. 191). She suggests that “the senses together enable us to
make sense of place” (Dee, 2001, p. 191). Despite these observations being made about
the predominance that the visual holds, design education continues to focus on sight (Have
& van den Toorn, 2012, p. 74). In this book, we suggest removing this hierarchical thinking
and paying equal attention to each of the main senses while recording and analyzing a
site. This strategy will reduce visual presumptions and treat every design problem as a lived
experience and not just a series of visual compositions.

Exploring the use of hand drawing to develop visual literacy is no longer emphasized in
design schools in the same way that it was during the times of the Bauhaus or the École des
Beaux Arts. Current theory has developed two reasons for why this is: 1) hand drawing and
visual literacy are both skills that are now treated as “innate skill” (Moore, 2003, p. 34), and
2) the advent of new technology has led students and educators to emphasize the learning
of new software over learning more conventional modes of design like hand drawing, and
many design programs have shifted their curriculum to accommodate for that.

Design instructors perceive visual literacy as something that students are expected to have
before entering the design world. This belief has created a system in which new design
thinkers can be overwhelmed when attempting to teach themselves a skill that is no longer
extensively taught in the architectural curriculum. The ability to draw has been seen by
designers in tandem with visual literacy, and with it the notion that a student inherently knows
how to draw prior to even entering a design program. While sketching will take place in
some of the earlier courses in a design program sequence, sketching has ultimately become
“separated from normal architectural discourse” (Jenkins, 2013, p. 29) due to the introduction

9
 of new technology. This can be daunting for students who are coming from backgrounds
that are not in the fine arts and have not been taught about hand drawing or visual analysis.
Furthermore, in a society where failure and taking risks is perceived as negative, students are
often afraid to learn through media with which they are unfamiliar (Adams, 1986, p. 44).
As Brumberger notes, “students often come to our classes with the firm belief that they have
no talent and therefore cannot learn to be good visual communicators. This belief stands in
the way of their learning to think visually, which in turn stands in the way of their learning to
communicate visually” (2007, p. 383).

The Hand vs. The Computer

Technology has caused a major shift in the way that designers analyze and conceptualize—
hand drawing no longer plays the same role that it once did in a student’s design process.
While technological knowledge is important to foster in design pedagogy, it is important to
strike a balance between the computer and the hand. As Treib notes “electronic processing
does not yet substitute for thinking” (2008, p. viii). Northcut and Brumberger conducted
a study regarding the influence of technology in education and its effect on students. The
results indicated that the emphasis on technology in design education “undermine[d] that
learning process” (Northcut & Brumberger, 2010, p. 463). It was observed that students
were spending most of their time “creating effects with technology” rather than learning
about the design process (Northcut & Brumberger, 2010, p. 464). This pointed to a larger
issue of students neglecting important aspects of their design process, such as engaging with
the site or developing a strong design concept, in favour of developing their graphic and
technological skills. The use of the camera, AutoCAD, and Google Maps are note-worthy
examples of technology that can be extremely useful but also potentially detrimental to the
learning process in early design education.

For instance, the camera serves as an excellent tool for capturing a site quickly and is a
useful memory/recording and thinking tool in site analysis (and we will touch on this more
in Chapter 3). There is also cause to be wary about using cameras before practicing
site immersion, as photographs “cannot record concepts, underlying structure, schematic
organization, or anything else that the eye cannot see all at once” (Crowe & Laseau, 2012,
p. 1). Crowe and Laseau argue that the camera has led to a “decline in visual literacy in
general” (2012, p. 1). The speed and ease of photography does not convey the emotions
or atmosphere of a space, both of which are crucial to site analysis. The same can be said
about mapping applications such as Google Maps. While these applications are integral
for developing an understanding of the site, they do not convey how all the senses are being
stimulated and the perception that the viewer has when physically present on the site. This is
where sketching provides something that the camera cannot capture. Sketching in-situ allows
students to develop “a personal response to the locality” (Hutchinson, 2011, p. 11). On-site
sketching forces one to spend more time in a place, walking and looking more closely, and
perhaps noticing more quantifiable data in addition to a deeper qualitative or emotional
understanding.

John May refers to the present state of design practice as the “post-orthographic period,”
where the output is not “a representation of the world” but “a presentation of the world–
an automatic and perceptually up to date, real-time model of the world” (2017, p. 19).
Technology has allowed us to produce images so fast that the perception and meaning of the
changes can barely be processed by the brain fast enough. By using the computer, students

10
 1.3
Lines drawn on a computer provide a much
different character than lines drawn by hand;
drawn by Michelle Gagnon-Creeley, 2020

11
 are continuously processing images, leaving little space for drawing which May defines as a
series of hand-mechanical gestures that can be learned through practice (May, 2017, p. 19).

However, like learning computer-based skills, drawing is a pedagogical learning tool.

Drawing teaches seeing. Because it involves physically creating, it is a craft and a thinking
tool. In fact, it is a multisensorial experience to draw, as it involves the senses of touch
(hand/brain), sight (eye/brain), and sound (ear/brain). Hand sketching is an extremely
fast visual communication tool that can also serve as an excellent learning and correction
tool. If practiced regularly, one can produce immense numbers of recorded observations
and perceptions experienced in the environment and analyze the problems visually
through drawings. The fundamental purpose is to understand the meaning and produce an
interpretation of the environmental context in relation to the design problem through drawing.
Visual literacy means that hand drawing is not used just to record what one sees but to
speculate beyond what is before us. Visual literary is the “interaction between knowing and
seeing” (Bruno Latour as quoted in Have & van den Toorn, 2012, p. 74).

It is important to note that we are not making the case for abolishing technology in design. We
recognize the vital importance that technology holds throughout the design process and that it
has greatly improved the discipline. What we are calling for is equilibrium between learning
technological skills and analog skills. We are calling for a hybrid in design pedagogy where
both digital rendering and hand drawing can co-exist and complement one another.

With the constant visual distractions of the technological world around us, educators and
students need to learn to see, interpret, and use visual imagery wisely in their design work
and allow thinking time and physical space away from digital tools to see and experience
the world. Human observation and recording skills have been extended with fast digital
recording tools. Has the brain evolved at the same pace as the digital tools in the last
decade? More research will be needed on this topic in the future. The digital tools are here
to stay for the time being and should be used together with analog tools as a hybrid during
analysis and the early design phase. While digital tools should be used in the later design
and communication phase of the project, hand drawing should continue to be encouraged
during the ideation and conceptualization process.

There should also be a shift in design education to allow for more site immersion. Syllabi
throughout design education should include local studio projects that allow for regular
site visits. During such visits, the different phases in design can be reiterated; seeing and
multisensorial perception, analysis, thinking, and designing. In design syllabi there is often
an imbalance of studio time to site time. Effective teaching and practicing of seeing can be
better achieved by intensive site immersion (which we will discuss in Chapter 5).

12
 1.4
The landscape
as multisensorial,
drawn by the
author, 2020

13
 Multisensorial Literacy as Solution
Multisensorial literacy involves intentionally seeing the world around us using the five senses
to observe, understand, analyze, and interpret this information into something visual. Seeing
and understanding the meaning of all senses within the environment, in combination with
recording and interpreting it, and then communicating design ideas are the most important
skills to be taught in design education. While the predominance of the visual has created
inspiring architecture, the lack of inclusion of the other senses creates spaces that are
impossible for everyone to connect to. Multisensorial design has the opportunity to fill this
gap, and to create spaces that better integrate into the world around us.

As mentioned above, visual literacy is something that design teachers are far more familiar
with teaching than multisensorial literacy. In multisensorial literacy, the observer has to record,
perceive, and interpret the meanings of not only sight but of sound, touch, smell, and taste
into visual imagery. Deeper explanations about all five senses are given in Chapter 4 along
with exercises. These exercises explore techniques and methods for how those senses can
be recorded with videos, collages, texts, performances, podcasts, annotated sketches,
diagrams, and drawings. Drawing and sketching are placed first as they are also faster and
more easily practiced in the field—so they also form the basis for the other media listed.

It is important to note that multisensorial perception skills are not the same as multisensorial
literacy skills. Multisensorial perception skills are the conscious understanding and recording
of the senses interplay with each other, for example sound and touch, or smell and taste,
or sight and taste. Multisensorial literacy is the method to observe the context of the design
problem with the five senses to understand, analyze, and document it through drawing and
recording tools.

In Chapter 2 sensory recording and visualization tools for each sense are listed. And later
on, those recordings and visualizations of the sensorial perception of the environment are
interpreted and analyzed by combining them for a given design problem, such as the
combination of smell and taste. The interpretation of the perceptional meaning of the senses
can be practiced with exercises described in Chapter 4 that focus on each individual sense.

When teaching and practicing seeing in the design process, digital tools are indeed
important, as they can initiate additional multisensorial observation and perception. Concrete
interpretations can be drawn from all five senses through the practice of multisensorial
observation and recording, combined with digital tools. Easily accessible digital tools can be
used to interpret the meaning of multisensorial images, experiences, and sensations around
us. For instance, the tablet can be used to draw images, and record sound or movement
through video. These digital tools expand static visual image recording, thereby increasing
the complexity of learning through seeing.

14
 Recommended Reads
The Eyes of the Skin, Juhani Pallasmaa (2005)
This book focuses on the “Question of Perception” in architecture and how the senses hold
significance in how humans experience architecture. It argues that the tactile (suppressed)
senses are as important as, if not more important than, vision when designing. This book
provides an understanding of why observation and perception with all the senses is important
in the design process.

Drawn to Design, Eric Jenkins (2013)

This book is an essential tool for developing freehand analytical sketching skills in architecture.
It has a succinct theoretical component explaining sketching as a method of exploration
and design thinking. It acknowledges and includes digital design process and emphasizes
freehand drawing as a recording and observation tool of the design environment. This book
is important, as it provides a theoretical and visual argument including drawings as examples
for why we need to continue to teach analytical hand drawing.

Form and Fabric in Landscape Architecture: A Visual Introduction, Catherine Dee (2001)
This book focuses on visual observation and perception, and analytical understanding of the
environment to initiate design thinking. In the final chapters, Dee visualizes through drawings
and text her own observations and personal (tacit) knowledge on the senses—how plants,
structures, and rocks might smell, taste or feel—further developing this idea that site analysis
can be a deeply personal experience. This book provides a comprehensive visual approach
to the study of landscape architecture by creating a spatial morphology based on use and
experience of landscapes.

Field Sketching and the Experience of Landscape, Janet Swailes (2016)

This book focuses on observing and recording the landscape through site immersion and field
sketching. Primarily geared towards landscape architects, it is also applicable for architects
and urban designers. The book has a theoretical component about field observation and
perception and provides techniques and examples to practice field sketching. This book is a
comprehensive textbook for how to sketch in the environment.

Drawing/Thinking-Confronting an Electronic Age, Marc Treib (Ed.) (2008)

This book is written by architects, landscape architects, artists, historians, and curators about
their personal stories on the merits of hand drawing supporting the design process in the
computer age. This book is important because it captures a specific time period in which
many people trained in traditional design methods were trying to make sense of and confront
the advent of electronic drawings and what it meant for teaching and practice.

Drawing for Landscape Architecture, Edward Hutchinson (2011)

This book combines traditional hand drawing techniques with CAD rendering. It is a
textbook which guides readers from a site visit’s first visual notes to concept, design ideas,
and representation, as well as construction and site drawings. This book is important as it
combines the use of analog and digital design processes.

15
 References
Adams, J. (1986). Conceptual Blockbusting: A Guide to Better Ideas. Cambridge MA:
Perseus Books.

Berger, J. (1972). Ways of Seeing. London, UK: Penguin Books.

Biddulph, M. (2014). Drawing and thinking: Representing place in the practice of place-
making. Journal of Urban Design, 19(3), 287-297. doi:10.1080/13574809.2014.890045.

Brumberger, E. R. (2007). Making the strange familiar: A pedagogical exploration of

visual thinking. Journal of Business and Technical Communication, 21(4), 376-401. doi:
10.1177/1050651907304021

Crowe, N. & Laseau, P. (2012). Visual Notes for Architects and Designers. Hoboken, NJ:
John Wiley & Sons.

Dee, C. (2001). Form and Fabric in Landscape Architecture: A Visual Introduction. New
York, NY: Routledge.

Have, R. & van der Toorn, M. (2012). The role of hand drawing in basic design education
in the digital age, ENMA 2012, 72-80.

Hutchinson, E. (2011). Drawing for Landscape Architecture. New York, NY: Thames &
Hudson.

Jasper, A., & Wagner, N. (2018). Smell E. Lupton and A. Lipps (Eds.) The Senses: Design
beyond Vision (p. 50). New York, NY: Princeton Architecture Press.

Jenkins, E. J. (2013). Drawn to Design. Basel: Birkhauser.

May, J. (2017). Everything is already an image. Log, 40, 9-26. https://www.anycorp.

com/store/log40

Moore, K. (2003). Overlooking the visual. The Journal of Architecture, 8(1), 24-50.
doi:10.1080/1360236032000068497

Northcut, K. M. & Brumberger, E. R. (2010). Resisting the lure of technology-driven design:

Pedagogical approaches to visual communication. Technical Writing and Communication,
40(4): 459-471. doi: 10.2190/TW.40.4.f

Pallasmaa, J. (2005). The Eyes of the Skin. Chichester: Wiley Publishing.

Swailes, J. (2016). Field Sketching and the Experience of Landscape. Abingdon, UK:
Routledge.

Tilley, C. & Bennett, W. (2008). Body and Image: Exploration in Landscape

Phenomenology 2. Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast Press.

Treib, M. (2008). Drawing/Thinking: Confronting an Electronic Age. New York, NY:

Routledge.

16
 Chapter 2
Multisensorial Design Thinking

17
18
 2.1
The human brain, drawn
by the author, 2020

19
 An Introduction to Multisensorial Literacy
This chapter provides a series of frameworks and checklists that can begin to break down
what it means to develop multisensorial literacy. These tools support a more inclusive
understanding of how to observe and perceive the five main senses (touch, sound, smell,
taste, and sight), as well as initiate a more inclusive ideation process by involving all the
senses. The proposed design process suggests formulating a priority list of the senses at the
beginning and developing a matrix to decide which to include in the initial design vision. If the
five senses are intentionally included in the design process from the beginning, more attention
is paid to inclusive design outcomes.

Designing is communicating ideas. The word idea comes from the Greek word idein, which
means “to see”. How we record what we see can be done and represented in different
ways. How we see and work on the design problem at hand can also be done in different
ways. For designers, site immersion is paramount. Before we start to design, we need to see,
understand, and record the existing conditions of the environment we are going to design
for—from an object to a geographic region.

When observing a site through a multisensorial spatial experience, all senses should
always be included throughout the analysis phase. A multisensorial observation will result
in a more inclusive survey of the space and will help guide a mindful design. In the design
phase however, not all senses will necessarily be included, as certain senses may be more
applicable to the design than others.

The senses help:

to order design priorities

to define the design purpose
to refine the built spatial experience
to prioritize and synthesize the design purpose
to perceive the design problem for each sense (touch, smell, taste, sound, sight)
to refine the design problem
to visualize the design problem with sound, movement, sight
to invoke our memories and personal knowledge
to create inclusive and personable spaces
to understand and consider of the perspectives of people, for instance who are visual,
hearing, or physically impaired in a society that privileges vision

20
21
 When designing a small urban public garden there are many things to
consider while first analyzing the site. We would want to understand
its context within its specific location in a neighbourhood—how the
surrounding position of buildings might cast shade on the garden,
impacting the choice of appropriate plants to be included. We
would want to examine the space in terms of accessibility—how the
garden can be made wheelchair accessible from the street. These
are considerations that we may be able to deduce from satellite
imagery or online photos, but it would be much more enriching
to personally visit the place in question. When we employ a site
immersive, multisensorial strategy, the resulting analysis connects the
body and mind to the place. For instance, recognizing the feeling
of how your feet interact with the paved textured surface (smooth
vs. rough vs. gritty) is as important as how the path looks and acts
as a visual guide (colour, texture, visibility). With careful attention to
the senses, we can better understand how others may interact with
the place differently from their own default experience. For instance,
the rolling vibration and sound of a wheelchair on this surface,
or the ease of use for a person using a wheelchair could not be
understood from photos alone.

2.2
A garden is a multisensorial space
activating all the senses., drawn by
the author, 2020

22
 2.3
The brain processes the senses
(observation) and synthesizes
them with perception to
create a multisensorial
experience.

23
 Observation vs. Perception
It is important to include all the senses when observing the context of a design problem
and when designing the vision (Have & van den Toorn, 2012, p. 75). It is also important to
distinguish between:

a) observing : the cognitive act of hearing, tasting, touching, smelling, and seeing

b) perception: the synthesis, memories, emotions, and feelings experienced in

tandem with these new sensorial experiences

The observation and perception of the senses is complex and requires us to be extremely
mindful in the ways that we interact with space. It is a challenge to rely solely upon our eyes to
tell a story, but a dependence on sight alone provides us with an incomplete experience. The
other senses should also be intentionally experienced, integrated, and documented, to more
thoroughly understand the existing context in which one designs. Juhani Pallasmaa writes “an
architectural work is not experienced as a series of isolated retinal pictures, but in its fully
integrated material, embodied and spiritual essence” (Pallasmaa, 2005, p. 12).

24
 An Overview of the Senses
We would be remiss without spending some time briefly defining these five senses that we
keep mentioning and how they pertain to design in this book. A more detailed focus on each
sense and how to record and render them can be found in Chapter 4.

Sight is the translator of light and colour in our everyday life.

Seeing gives us knowledge. The major problem in visual
perception is what people see is not simply a translation of
an image on the retina. We see the world right side up, even
though the image on the retina is upside down (because it has
passed through the lens). It is actually a much more complicated
Sight

process that happens in order to create what we actually see.

The key is that the brain works on the data from the eyes, and
marries it with memories and guesses, all at lightning speed. The
result is an experience of the world which looks to each person
as if it were simple reality. However, although based on reality,
it is actually a mental construct, built by the brain.

Touch is the first sense we experience and acquire (Mau,

2018, p. 22). Touch connects us, physically and spatially (three
dimensionally) to the world. Pressure, temperature, light touch,
vibration, pain, and other sensations are all part of the act of
touching and are all attributed to different receptors in the
skin. Touch is not only a functional necessity—it is important for
Touch

human emotional well-being. Touch can influence our human

perception, actions, and bodily awareness (Bradford, 2017).
Touch is essential in design—it dictates the feeling of an object,
and how our bodies move and physically interact within a
space.

25
 Sound in its most scientific form is a chain of molecules that
vibrate in a wave that is initiated by a source of disturbance
(Lupton, 2018, p. 44). When the wave hits the inner ear, the
vibration causes the brain to process the wave as what we
refer to as sound (Lupton, 2018, p. 44). Sound is a spatial
Sound

experience; it is physical, as the vibrations provide a sensorial

experience that can feel open or enclosed depending on the
materiality and design of the space. For example, animals like
whales and bats use echolocation to visualize their world.

Research on smell has been minimal, but in recent years we

have learned a great deal about how our noses work. New
research suggests that humans can discriminate among one
trillion different odours (Jasper & Wagner, 2018, p. 50; Lipps,
2018, p. 121). Smell is memory (Lipps, 2018, p. 110). Smell is
spatial. For example, Japanese bathrooms made with cedar
Smell

wood do not only have antiseptic properties, but the citrus scent
also creates a clean atmosphere (Lipps, 2018, p. 113). Smell
is everywhere and the information it carries is important for
survival and pleasure (Lipps, 2018, p. 110).

On the tongue there are little bumps called taste buds which
have the ability to differentiate five tastes: sweet, salty, sour,
bitter, and umami. Our tongues can also experience a
sensation/perception of temperature, such as the heat from a
hot pepper or the cooling effect of mint (Patterson & Aftel, 2017,
p. 27). We would be remiss if we did not mention the leading
Taste

role that the nose plays in all of this (with the mouth playing more
of a supporting role). When we combine smell with taste, we
get flavour, which is where things start to get interesting. Flavour
is not just how the food tastes on your tongue; it is a combination
of smell, texture, and visual appearance. It is a deeply personal
sense; not one person shares the exact same preferences.
Flavour perception changes over time as we grow older and
our taste buds lose their sensitivity, and we begin to prefer the
taste of coffee over candy. Taste is like a musical composition
using all of the other senses to create the symphony of flavours
that makes up the tasting experience.

26
 The Phases of Design
Design is a series of events that begin with a site visit and end with a built space, including its
maintenance, growth, and development over time.

There are generally six phases of design:

1) Site immersion
2) Recording
3) Analysis
4) Synthesis
5) Ideation
6) Final design

This process is not necessarily linear, and often takes on a circular movement or flux between
phases.

27
 2.4
The design process.

28
 2.5
Site Immersion

1) Site Immersion
To observe and understand the space for which you are designing, physically visiting and
immersing within it is crucial. Site immersion is the first physical engagement with the site, and
this procedure should be repeated multiple times throughout the entire design process. As
design is a continuously changing operation, the site must be understood from many different
angles. Site analysis is best achieved by roaming, as it provides the most comprehensive
observation and perception of the site. If a site is too large to walk and a car or plane is used,
the observation becomes solely visual. To achieve a holistic multisensorial site understanding,
multiple walking excursions should be carried out to achieve a holistic, multisensorial site
understanding.

29
 2) Recording
There are multiple tools available to record the observations, perceptions, and sensations
experienced during site immersion. A list of tools is provided later in this chapter, in the
Multisensorial Perception Recording and Visualization Tools table. Traditionally, field
sketching, photography, writing, and maps were used. These tools have typically been
used to document visual observations, often ignoring the other senses. Today, with easier
access to digital tools, we can also record sound, movement, and even temperature. This
allows for a wider multisensorial palette of recording. Recording is a thinking process that
has been traditionally done by hand drawing with annotation. With digital sound recording
tools we can record the sounds we hear. The action of visually and digitally recording the
observations, perceptions, and sensations of the site immersion experience ignites the design
thinking process. Chapter 4 shows examples of multisensorial recording.

2.6
Recording

30
 2.7
Site analysis

3) Analysis
Site analysis is the process of creating an inventory of everything that has been recorded, and
then developing theories, conclusions, and ideas. The analysis primarily deals with revealing
the information of a site that is not visible to the eye, as it relates to the site and its surrounding
context. Traditionally, hand drawings, maps, and diagrams were used to carry out the
analysis in design. Plan, section, elevation, perspective views, and block diagrams, oblique
and exploded views were all used to reveal the visible and invisible. Today a combination of
digital modelling and hand drawing are used to carry out the analysis. The analysis begins
the detailed design process by exposing the visual and non-visual data of a site, creating
initial design ideas. This type of synthesis is described in more detail in Chapter 4.

31
 4) Synthesis
Synthesis is the process of bringing together all the data from the site analysis and the
design program (design wishes by the client) and determining through drawing how to
approach design problems and generate ideas to address the design program. The drawing
tools include mapping, diagrams, orthographic drawings, and layering of drawings and
perspectives “to visualize processes, sequences and change” (Have & van den Toorn, 2012,
p. 76). The drawing tools are used to visualize the combined thoughts of the analysis and
initiate design ideas. This process is a cycle in continuous flux and repeatedly raises new
analytical observations and design questions until the designer is satisfied with the result. This
part of the drawing process “takes place in the mind and results in a visual representation, a
drawing, a sketch,” or digital modelling (Have & van den Toorn, 2012, p. 76). The synthesis is
a combination of the client’s wishes, the program, and the analysis, visualized through drawn
ideas.

2.8
Synthesis

32
 2.9
Ideation

5) Ideation
The ideation process is the imagination of what a site could be. This is a process where a
range of design proposals is drawn for a site to test the possibilities of different ideas. The
drawings act as a representational, thinking, and decision-making tool. Ideas are refined
through different drawing scales, ultimately supporting the decision for the final design
proposal. The design ideas should offer different answers to the problems at hand. Many
designs, however, can create new problems, requiring new design solutions. It is therefore
important to always consider alternative approaches to the design problem.

33
 2.10
Final Design

6) Final Design
The final design is a set of drawn ideas with orthographic drawings, including digital 3D
and physical models, diagrams, perspectives, and recently, animated 3D videos with sound.
The final design also presents, in more detail, the concept of the project, and uses detailed
drawings to explain it: for example, how the structure of the building would look or how, in
landscape architecture, a dyke would be constructed. Detailed drawings are needed to
convince a client that the design is viable, buildable, and functional. In most cases, a designer
creates two to three proposals to be presented to a client.

34
 2.11
The interconnectedness
of the senses

35
 Methods for Interpreting the Senses
A seeing framework for spatial designers
Before beginning a design, every designer must understand the environment in which they
will design. Architecture, landscape architecture, planning, industrial design, and civil
engineering students and practitioners have to observe the environment to understand the
design context. Most often, the sense of sight and visual tools are used to study and document
the environment. These tools include maps, data, graphs, diagrams, visual notes (analytical
and referential hand or digital representation and field sketches), photography (aerial or eye
level views) and videos. However, this method is visually driven and often excludes the other
four senses. This is because the other four senses can be difficult to conceptualize, observe,
record, and document. Now, with handheld digital recording devices, more ways to record
these senses exist at our fingertips. This allows for multisensorial observation to be carried out
and recorded more easily than ever before.

Including the other senses is important, as they make the observations and design outcomes
more multisensorially inclusive. For example, how can people that are deaf or hard of hearing
be notified of a fire while asleep if they are unable to hear the sounds of smoke detectors
and fire alarms? Many deaths occur due to deaf or hard of hearing persons not hearing
the smoke alarm (Lipps, 2018, p. 119). Japanese researchers developed a fire alarm that
emits wasabi, which physically irritates the nose enough to wake humans up in the event
of an emergency (Lipps, 2018, p. 119). Without understanding the multisensorial context
and having an understanding of the senses and how they work, the industrial designers and
researchers could not have come up with this idea. Multisensorial thinking creates innovative
and holistic designs.

Thinking multisensorially is important for the following reasons:

To understand the recording and visualization tools of the individual senses;
To understand how an individual sense can be cross-referenced with another;
To understand how an individual sense can be analysed and visualized with
the help of other senses, for example using visual representation to describe the
intensity and spatiality of smell.

The advantage of multisensorial analysis is that it also introduces a myriad of new analysis
tools. Smart phones and tablets offer a readily available method of recording digital
sound and movement, providing a layer of valuable information to designers. For instance,
“soundscape” mapping could help landscape architects to understand the sounds of an
ecosystem. The recordings of certain bird species on a site could help to determine if an
ecosystem is healthy or not. An analysis of man-made vs. natural sounds could indicate if a
space is imbalanced. Restorative gardens already aspire to this (Mooney, 2020, p. 32), but
shouldn’t the design of all parks, buildings, and objects aspire to do this as well?

The methods demonstrated in the following pages offer a series of recording and
visualization tools to document and design using the senses. This methodology for site
observation, recording, and analysis must be gradually taught and practiced throughout the
span of an entire design degree. In all design studios this should be regularly applied. With
the additional digital tools available, we are now able to observe the environment more
precisely. To practice this approach to design, it is crucial to supplement young designers’
personal knowledge with multisensorial observation exercises as suggested in Chapter 4.

36
 Recording and Visualizing the Senses
The following table focuses on methods to record and visualize the senses during site
observation, perception, and analysis of design. These recording and visualization
tools allow students to record their observations and think about how the senses
interact spatially. These tools can be applied at all scales, from an object, to a site, to a
neighbourhood, to an entire region.

The goals of this table are:

To develop an understanding of how the senses operate at different
scales—from an object, to a site, to a neighbourhood, to a region;
To develop an understanding of how the senses interact in a spatial
context;
To develop a heightened awareness of space;
To develop an understanding of what tools to use in the observation and
analysis phase of a design;
To develop an understanding of what tools to use to record and visualize
the different senses.
It is important to note that the following table is not exhaustive, and the techniques listed
are merely suggestions. Students are encouraged to explore any avenue to which they
feel called as they immerse themselves in their environments.

37
 Recording Tools Visualization

Visual notes Section Photography

Photo Plan Video
Video Axonometric drawing Photomontage
Mapping Perspective Collage
Aerial map 3D Digital modelling Creative writing
Drone imagery Mapping
Sight

Text Analytical diagrams

Model making

Visual notes Section Audio recording

Photo Axonometric Photo
Video 3D printing Video
Mapping Touch mapping Photomontage
Material collection Collage
Touch

Text Creative writing

Descriptive writing
Model

Audio recording Graph Music

Visual notes Sound mapping Dance
Photo Plan Photography
Video Perspective Video
Mapping Material maps Photomontage
Sound

Text Collage Creative writing

Model 1:1
Audio recording

Visual notes Mapping Audio recording

Photo Collage Creative writing
Video Creative writing
Mapping Annotated drawings
Material collection Diagram
Text Photo
Smell

Video
Photomontage

Visual notes Personal experience Audio recording

Photo Diagram Photo
Video Section Video photomontage
Mapping Axonometric
Audio recording Creative writing
Text Collage
Taste

Mapping
Model

38
 Analyzing the Interaction of the Senses
This table encourages analytical thinking by cross-referencing between the different
senses. This should help to understand the multisensorial spatial experience of the
environment’s essence. The senses never work individually; they always work consciously
or unconsciously in combination with other senses. When practicing environmental
observations and perception, one should consciously begin with an individual sense
first and then synthesize. The other senses to synthesize are mentioned in each sense
category.

The goals of this table are:

To develop an understanding of how the senses interact with one another;

To develop a comprehensive understanding of the senses and their
impacts on the body and space;
To adopt the importance of mindfulness as a process in site immersion
and analysis;
To develop a detailed vocabulary to describe different sensorial
experiences for objects and sites.

The following tables provide suggestions for how individual sense perception and
sensation can be described and represented in combination with other senses. Sight
can be represented referentially; while the others can only be represented analytically.

39
 The following table demonstrates how an object might be analyzed by referring to the senses:

Sight Touch Sound Smell Taste

shiny, red bumpy squishy sweet sweet, tart

Strawberry

yellow smooth, n/a sweet sweet

Banana
pasty

round, flaky, crunch fresh salty

Potato chips
yellow gritty

silver, light sandy clunky wood, resin n/a

Wooden chair
form

The same logic can be used during site immersion:

Sight Touch Sound Smell Taste

Remedial lush, green soft, smooth rustling herbal, herbal

garden floral

Vegetable colourful, soft crunchy, earth, earthy, sweet,

garden dense rustling sweet sour

Medieval dark, cold, damp, echo musty, moldy musty

church shadow wet

Arid hilly, sandy, dry, hot, muted, wind, dry, fruity dry
ecosystem earth tones cold, gritty hawks

The diagrams on the following pages further highlight this interaction.

40
 The Sensorial Analysis of a Strawberry

Physical Act
(in order of interaction)

Observation

41
 ambience of space

food experience

mother’s cooking

Cognition Synthesis
(memories, emotions, feelings)

Perception

42
 The Sensorial Analysis of a Landscape

1
hilly, gentle,
earth-tones

dry, fruity

muted

4
hot, cold,
dusty

Physical Act
(in order of interaction)

Observation

43
 childhood memories

happy

adventurous

scared

gathering

Cognition Synthesis
(memories, emotions, feelings)

Perception

44
 Sensorial Design Synthesizing List
The Sensorial Design Synthesizing List is a suggested checklist to include multisensorial design
problem solving and initiate future visions for the design problem. After the design environment
and its context have been understood and documented through the Multisensorial Perception
Recording and Visualization Tools, the next step is to continue with a multi-sensory inclusive
design process. The following uses the sensory information acquired through site analysis to
do that. The icons suggested can be aligned to the senses one feels and should be prioritized
at the beginning of the design, then synthesized with the others. This list acts as a reminder for
the designer to include the five main senses in the design ideation process.

1. What is the design problem and its scale?

Region
Neighbourhood
Block
Site
Object

2. Visualize the design problem diagrammatically

Plan
Section
Perspective
Axonometric
3D model
Elevation
Video
Photography
Photomontage
Etc.

3. Rank the senses given the design problem. During this process, consider
users who might not have access to certain senses and how this limitation
might shift their design needs.

45
 4. Prioritize importance to design problem and list sensory considerations
For example, the design of a fence

Sense Priority Sensory Considerations

1. Touch Physical comfort, texture of

materiality

2. Sight Form: light or heavy

structure, moving or fixed

3. Smell Materiality, site

surroundings

4. Sound Sound of wood, plastic,

steel, leather, etc.

5. Taste n/a

5. List further design questions

Material
Form
Surface texture
Durability
Use
Cost
Etc.

6. Begin design process

The following pages include several examples for how this list can be used;
from a chair to a garden.

46
 A Chair

1. What is the design problem and its scale?

Object
Design problem: creating a chair for outdoor seating,
comfortable, durable, light, easy to handle

2. Visualize the design problem diagrammatically

Form: light frame, sharp

angled, light surface,
colour
1
Physical comfort: smooth
surface, water repellent

Sound of material

Materiality; 2
relation to site,
weather-specific
2

47
 3. Rank the senses given the design problem
at first glance:

1 1 2 3

when considering the visually impaired:

1 1 2 3

4. Prioritize importance to design problem and list sensory considerations

sensorial design priority for the visually impaired:

Sense Priority Sensory Considerations

1. Touch Physical comfort: smooth surface,

water repellent

2. Smell Materiality: related to site, smell

changes due to weather

3. Sound Sound of material

4. Sight Form: light frame, sharp angled,

light surface, colour

5. List further design questions

Material–locally sourced, recyclable?
Form–modern, classic, contemporary?
Surface texture–smooth painted or not?
Durability–materiality: wood, steel, plastic or aluminum?
Use outside on soft or stable ground, does it need to be stored
and stacked at night?
Cost–who is the client public or private?

48
 A Fence

1. What is the design problem and its scale?

Object
Design problem: creating a fence to safeguard a garden from animals;
should show plants on approach; care should be taken to consider those
who are visually impaired

2. Visualize the design problem diagrammatically

Materiality:
soft surface,
wood surface,
1 rounded edges, etc.

Materiality:
wooden smell,
natural material
2

Materiality:
sound of fence from
wind, sound deflector
3

Form,
colour,
material texture,
4 open or dense
structure,
scale

49
 3. Rank the senses given the design problem

at first glance:

1 2 3 4

when considering the visually impaired:

2 4 3 1

4. Prioritize importance to design problem and list sensory considerations

Sense Priority Sensory Considerations

1. Touch Materiality: soft surface, wood

surface, rounded edges, etc.

2. Sound Materiality: sound of fence from

wind, sound deflector

3. Smell Materiality: wooden smell, natural

material

4. Sight Form, colour, material texture, open

or dense structure, scale

5. List further design questions

Material–locally sourced, recyclable?
Form–relating to surrounding context?
Surface texture–smooth or rough, painted or not?
Durability–materiality: wood, steel, plastic or aluminum?
Use–public or private use, vandalism, safety, reduce sharp
edges
Cost–who is the client, public or private?

50
 A Partitioning Wall

1. What is the design problem and its scale?

Site / building
Design problem: designing a partition wall in a building that is light weight,
sustainable, with no use of chemicals, care should be taken to consider
those who have allergies

2. Visualize the design problem diagrammatically

Sustainable,
low chemical,
hypoallergenic
1

Materiality:
reaction to temperature,
texture of surface
2

Colour,
texture

Sound
absorbent
4

51
 3. Rank the senses given the design problem
at first glance:

1 2 3 4

when considering those with allergies:

3 2 1 4

4. Prioritize importance to design problem and list sensory

considerations
Sense Priority for those Sensory Considerations
sensitive to allergens

1. Smell Sustainable, low chemical,

hypoallergenic

2. Touch Materiality: reaction to

temperature, texture of surface

3. Sight Colour, texture

4. Sound Sound absorbant

5. List further design questions

Cost
Material–locally sourced, recyclable?
Surface texture–smooth or rough, painted?
Durability–material wood, aluminum and plasterboard?
Use–inside public or private use, room sound activity-
domestic, commercial?

52
 A Garden

1. What is the design problem and its scale?

Site
Design problem: designing a pocket garden easily accessible
for the a visually impaired person

2. Visualize the design problem diagrammatically

Plant smell, materiality

smell (weather dependent),
where to place specific
2 scents

Foot path surface

material, planting
touch experience,
1 fence materiality,
harvesting access

53
 Materiality; footpath
sound, sound of
vegetation, sound of
4 fence

54
 Colours of
materials and
vegetation.
3 Form of seating,
fence, plant beds,
foot path, etc.

Taste of harvested
fruit and
vegetables
5

3. Rank the senses given the design problem

Sensory hierarchy in garden entrance/approach, when considering those
who are visually impaired:

1 2 3 4 5

Sensory hierarchy inside the garden:

1 2 3 4 5

55
 4. Prioritize importance to design problem and list sensory considerations

Sense Priority Sensory Considerations

1. Smell Plant smell

Materiality smell (weather
dependent)
Where to place specific scents

2. Touch Foot path surface material

Planting touch experience
Fence materiality
Harvesting access

3. Sight Colours of materials and vegetation

Form of seating, fence, plant beds,
foot path, etc.

4. Sound Materiality:
footpath sound
sound of vegetation
sound of fence

5. Taste Taste of harvested fruit and

vegetables

5. List further design questions

Materiality of path–soft or hard, small or large, gravel or asphalt?
Form of planting–variety of textures, different plant sizes, leaf textures, soft
and hard leaves, hairy or glossy leaves?
Durability–material wood, steel, plastic or aluminum?
Colour–visual experience of plants, fence, path, bench and seasons?
Cost–who is the client public or private?

56
 Recommended Reads
The Senses: Design beyond Vision, Ellen Lupton & Andrea Lipps (2018)
This book is a current summary focusing on the main senses beyond vision. It is a concise
description of current extraordinary thinkers on multisensorial all-inclusive design practice.
This book opens one’s eyes, ears, mouth, nose and skin to sense the world holistically.
The book provides inspiring ideas and principles for the sensory richness of objects,
environment, and media.

Envisioning Information, Edward Tufte (1990)

This book displays beautiful and compelling visuals of highly complex data. The most
design oriented of Tufte’s books, it presents maps, charts, scientific presentations, diagrams,
computer interfaces, statistical graphics and tables, stereo photographs, guidebooks,
timetables, uses of colour, and other displays of information. The book provides practical
advice about how to explain complex material through visual means, with well-chosen
examples to illustrate the fundamental principles of information displays.

Beautiful Evidence, Edward Tufte (2006)

This book provides examples of the ways in which we can display data that are visually
coherent and compelling. The book identifies methods for showing multiple types of
information, suggests many new designs, and provides analytical tools for assessing the
credibility of evidence presentations (which are seen from both sides, such as how to
produce and how to consume presentations).

57
 References
Bradford, A. (2017). “The five and more senses”. Retrieved from https://www.livescience.
com/60752-human-senses.html

Have, R. & van der Toorn, M. (2012). The role of hand drawing in basic design education
in the digital age. International Conference on Engineering and Mathematics, Bangalore,
2012. Les Ulis, FR: EDP Sciences.

Lipps, A. (2018). Scentscape. In E. Lupton and A. Lipps (Eds.) The Senses: Design beyond
Vision (pp. 109-121). New York, NY: Princeton Architecture Press.

Lupton, E. (2018). Flavour. In E. Lupton and A. Lipps (Eds.) The Senses: Design beyond
Vision, ed. Lupton and Lipps (pp. 66-71). New York, NY: Princeton Architecture Press.

Mau, B. (2018). Designing Live. In E. Lupton and A. Lipps (Eds.) The Senses: Design
beyond Vision (pp. 22). New York, NY: Princeton Architecture Press.

Mooney, P. (2020). Planting Design: Connecting People and Place. Abingdon:

Routledge.

Pallasmaa, J. (2005). The Eyes of the Skin, Chichester: Wiley Publishing.

Patterson, D. & Aftel, M. (2017). The Art of Flavor: Practices and Principles for Creating
Delicious Food. New York, NY: Riverhead Books.

58
Chapter 3
Sensewalks
61
 On Sensewalks
This chapter takes a look at real-life applications of multi-sensory design. Through 12
gardens, we will demonstrate how each of these sites engages with the senses. This
chapter’s mapping was inspired from a book chapter published by the author in 2020
titled “Sense…ible Parks and Gardens” in which he describes the idea of sensewalks, and
how these could be a strategy for sensitizing the public to protect ecological and cultural
heritage in their neighbourhoods (Roehr, 2020, pp. 81-389).

Sensewalks are not new; they have been experimented with since the early 1960’s for
research and educational purposes (Henshaw, 2014, p.42). For instance, soundwalks,
were first introduced in the early 1970’s by Raymond Murray Schafer at Simon Fraser
University in Vancouver, Canada (Henshaw, 2014, p. 42). Soundwalking was an attempt to
heighten the sensual experience in the environment by intentionally disabling a sense such
as sight (through blindfolding) in order to experience sound more deeply. Westerkamp’s
soundwalking activity guides participants to engage with a space through the description
of sound (Westerkamp, 2007, pp. 49-58). Learning to listen was key in familiarizing the
participants to a myriad of sounds.

Similar to soundwalks, a researcher at Sheffield University named Victoria Henshaw

organizes smellwalks with the general public to research and understand the perception of
urban smells. Kate McLean, an artist and scholar also organizes smellwalks and visualizes
her participatory findings in smellmaps. Both scholars inspire the public to engage in
conscious smelling of the environment. Henshaw organizes smellwalks to consciously
switch from a passive perception of smell into a receptive state of “smelling in search,”
and she uses these findings to formulate strategies to design for urban smell (2014, p.
43). McLean’s maps are gathered through shared group interpretation, with an aim of
facilitating more exploration and depiction of smells by the public (2018, p. 75). Recent
public participatory research and artistic visualization of smell has heightened people´s
awareness of multisensorial design, demonstrating that the smells of a space are as
important as the sounds it makes or its visual appearance. Many historic parks and gardens
are an essential part of the urban fabric and are havens for multisensorial exploration of the
senses. Combined with their cultural importance, they work like an interactive exhibition or
museum of sensory impressions.

The precedents provided give an insight to experiencing sites multisensorially. The

precedents presented are provided with a brief historic description with annotated
drawings that highlight the multisensorial experiences found in each of these gardens. Our
decision to focus on historic and contemporary gardens provides a condensed cultural and
historic experience where they are located and often includes buildings such as pavilions,
gazebos, and covered pergolas.

62
 Humble Administrator’s Garden
Wang Xiancheng
Suzhou, China

The Humble Administrator’s Garden is 5.6 hectares, making it the largest

ancient Chinese garden in Suzhou. The garden was built during the Ming
Dynasty, and is over 500 years old. It was listed as a UNESCO World
Heritage Site in 1997.

63
 Flying Rainbow Bridge Smooth, seamless walking experience;
Railings smooth to the touch

Millet Fragrance Hall Smooth, seamless walking experience

Touch

The Wave Corridor Undulating corridor; feel the change in the

slope of the ground, smooth surface

Artificial rockery A variety of texture experiences, from

smooth to gritty

Artificial rockery
Artificial rockery

The Wave Corridor

Artificial rockery

Artificial rockery

Flying Rainbow Bridge

Artificial rockery

Millet Fragrance Hall

64
 The Pine Wind Pavilion Light rustling of the pine leaves as wind
passes through

The Rain Veranda Surrounded by lotus, plantain, and

bamboo, you are able to listen to all the
Sound

different ways in which rain falls on the

leaves. From small drops, to gentle thuds,
to a shower, you experience an orchestra
of sounds.

The Stay-and-Listen Parlour Gentle thud of raindrops on lotus leaves

Snow-Fragrance-and-Rosy- Peaceful and quiet, peppered with the

Cloud Pavilion chirping of birds and the humming of
cicadas

The Malus Spring Castle Echoes, vast: this space is also where
guqin performances take place, as the
courtyard amplifies the sound of the
stringed instrument.

The Stay-and-Listen The Pine Wind

Parlour Pavilion

Snow-Fragrance­
and-Rosy-Cloud
Pavilion

The Malus
Spring Castle

Rain Veranda

65
 Lotus Chamber Fresh, fragrant smell of lotuses

Magnolia Hall Sweet fragrance of magnolia flowers

during the spring
Smell

Xue Xiang Yun Wei Pavilion Sweet smell of plum blossoms in winter and
spring

Snow-Fragrance-and-Rosy- Peaceful and quiet, peppered with the

Cloud Pavilion chirping of birds and the humming of
cicadas

The Boat-Structure Fresh, fragrant smell of lotuses

The Malus Spring Castle Sweet smell of crab apples as they bloom
in the spring

The Hall of Distant Fragrance Delicate smell of lotus leaves and flowers

Lotus Chamber

The Boat-Structure

Magnolia Hall
Snow-Fragrance­
and-Rosy-Cloud
Pavilion

The Malus
Spring Castle

Xue Xiang Yun Wei

Pavilion

The Hall of Distant

Fragrance

66
 Fin Garden
Kashan, Iran

Fin Garden is a 2.3 hectare historical Persian garden. It was built under the
rule of Abbas I of Persia during the 16th century and is known for its wide
variety of water features. It is the oldest existing garden in Iran and is a
UNESCO World Heritage Site.

67
 Throughout the site Natural stone paving: cold to the touch,
bumpy and rough surface on the feet

Waterways Cooling, soothing, gentle moving through

your fingers
Touch

Central pool Calm, cold on your hand

Waterways

Central pool

68
 Throughout the site All encompassing sound of water

Long pool Subtle calm splashing sound of the

fountains falling into the water
Sound

Central pool Calm, peaceful

Irrigation channels The gentle trickling of water as it enters the

channels

Water steps Soft flushing sound

Safavid Pavilion Calm, peaceful

Central pool

Safavid pavilion Water steps

Long pool

Irrigation channels

69
 Soil from the garden beds Earthy, musty

Throughout the site Pine and cypress trees: resinous, earthy,

fresh, subtly sweet
Smell

Garden beds

70
 Katsura Imperial Villa Gardens
Prince Hachijō Toshihito
Kyoto, Japan

Built in 1620, the Katsura Imperial Villa Gardens surround the villa of Prince
Hachijō Toshihito. Designed by the prince, the 6.9 hectare garden was
inspired immensely by passages from The Tales of Genji, a favourite of the
prince. It is often revered as the master example of traditional Japanese
gardens.

71
 Tsuzumi waterfall Refreshing, cool

Shirakawa-bashi Stone washing bowls, before entering

the tea pavilion, people are required to
wash their hands to cleanse the body and
Touch

mind; cleansing, refreshing, gritty texture,

peaceful

Suhama Shores of the lake: rough, smooth, gritty,

bumpy

Tsuzumi waterfall

Suhama

Shirakawa-bashi

72
 Throughout the site Rustling of pine needles as the wind moves
through them

Tsuzumi waterfall Rushing of water, loud, exciting, all-

encompassing in its sound
Sound

Shokin-tei Gentle thud of raindrops on the roof

Musical instrument room Echoes when empty, when music is played

it fills the room

Shokin-tei

Tsuzumi eaterfall

Musical instrument room

73
 Throughout the buildings A dry, sweet, straw-like smell wafts
throughout the buildings and the side from
the tatami mats

Tea rooms Muted smell, done purposefully so that

Smell

(Pine-Lute Pavilion, Onrindo, the tea fragrance can be thor-oughly

Shoiken) experienced while tasting. Tea smell is
herbal and sweet

Tea rooms Herbal, grassy, bitter, toasted, smooth

(Pine-Lute Pavilion, Onrindo,
Shoiken)
Taste

Shokin-tei Tea room

Onrin-do Tea room

Shoiken Tea room

74
 The Monumental Garden of Valsanzibio
Luigi Bernini
Valsanzibio, Italy

Zuane Francesco Barbarigo made a holy vow to create a “masterpiece”

as thanks to god for surviving the bubonic plague that prevailed in Italy
at the time. Built in the 17th century, these gardens became a place of
refuge and redemption, complete with vistas, fountains, and statues. The 16
hectare gardens are considered to be one of the most culturally significant
gardens in Italy.

75
 Labyrinth Boxwood feels textured, smooth, soft

Marble table Smooth, cold

The fountains of the gardens Moist, cool to the skin

Touch

Gravel pathways Gritty

The Fountain of
Water Tricks The Pila Fountain

The Fountain of the The Rainbow Fountain

Western “Putto”

The Fountain of the

Marble table
Eastern “Putto”

The Ecstasy Fountain

The Labyrinth

76
 The fountains of the gardens Splashing, trickling of water

Throughout the site The crunching from the gravel pathways;

rustling of boxwood and hornbeam leaves
in the wind
Sound

The Fountain of
Water Tricks The Pila Fountain

The Fountain of the The Rainbow Fountain

Western “Putto”

The Fountain of the

Eastern “Putto”

The Ecstasy Fountain

77
 Ponds Musky

The fountains of the gardens Clean, fresh

Labyrinth Resinous, musky, pine-line

Smell

The Fountain of
Water Tricks The Pila Fountain

The Fountain of the The Rainbow Fountain

Western “Putto”

The Fountain of the

Eastern “Putto”

The Ecstasy Fountain

Labyrinth

Pond

78
 Hidcote Manor Garden
Lawrence Johnston
Chipping Campden, United Kingdom

Lawrence Johnston was an esteemed garden designer in the United

Kingdom who purchased Hidcote Manor for him and his mother to live in.
Strongly influenced by the Arts and Crafts movement, Johnston designed
the garden in 1905 to include several garden rooms around the house, with
each serving its own purpose. He was also a horticulturalist and made an
effort to showcase plants from all over the world at Hidcote. Hidcote was
transferred to the National Trust in 1947.

79
 The bathing pool garden Cool atmosphere surrounding the fountain

The red borders and gazebos Stone steps, gravel, and lawn make up the
trails, so that the trail experience shifts from
smooth, to gritty, to soft
Touch

The plant house Warm, humid atmosphere

The plant house

The red borders and gazebos

The bathing pool garden

80
 The old garden Chirping of birds, buzzing of insects

Sound The bathing pool garden Trickling of water

The old garden

The bathing pool garden

The kitchen garden

81
 The rose walk Smell of roses, floral, sweet, all
encompassing

The white garden Floral, fragrant, soft

Smell

The plant house Earthy, fresh, fragrant in spring

The old garden Floral, fragrant, sweet

The kitchen garden Herbal, earthy

The kitchen garden Earthy, herbal, sweet, fresh

Taste

The rose walk

The old garden

The white garden

The plant house

82
 Villandry Gardens
Alix de Saint-Venant
Villandry, France

The garden surrounds the château of Villandry. It is an example of a formal

French garden of the Renaissance, with its symmetrical layout and box
hedging. The garden is divided into four parts: the sun garden, the kitchen
garden, the water garden, and the ornamental garden. The gardens were
destroyed in the 19th century and restored in 1908 by Joachim Carvallo.

83
 Gravel pathways Gritty

The Audience Pavilion Warmth, comfort

The maze Boxed hedges feel textured, smooth, soft

Touch

The Water Garden Cool atmosphere

The Audience Pavilion

The Water Garden

The maze

The Ornamental Garden

84
 The woodland Gentle rustling of the leaves as the wind
blows through them

The Water Garden Trickling water over steps, calm and quiet
around the pond, splashing of the fountains
Sound

The Ornamental Garden Chirping of birds, buzzing of insects,

rustling of leaves in the wind

The woodland

The Water Garden

The Ornamental Garden

85
 The Kitchen Garden Earthy, herbal, floral, sweet

The Sun Garden Floral, fragrant

The Herb Garden Herbal, earthy, floral, fresh

Smell

The Kitchen Garden Earthy, herbal, sweet, fresh

Taste

The Sun Garden

The Herb Garden

The Kitchen Garden

86
 William E. Carter School Sensory
Garden
David Berarducci
Boston, United States

This garden design was developed for a school that teaches students with
physical and learning disabilities. The school needed a space for youth
to be able to learn and ground themselves outdoors. The garden was
designed in 2002 with spaces for learning to grow plants, group activities,
and visual mobility training.

87
 Raised garden beds Easy to access for those with physical
disabilities, touching the earthy and sandy
soil as students work in the gardens

Grass lawn Soft, smooth

Touch

Pathways Smooth, level

Interactive water features Cool, refreshing

The garden Birds singing, insects buzzing

Fountain The sound of trickling water

Corridor The thumping sound of water falling on

Sound

the wooden roof when it rains

Planting area Fragrant, floral, sweet

Raised garden beds Earthy, herbal, fresh, floral

Smell

Food grown from raised Earthy, herbal, sweet, fresh

garden beds
Taste

88
 Oizumi Ryokuchi Park
Yoshisuke Miyake
Osaka, Japan

In the 1970s the “Garden of the Blind” was designed specifically for people
who were visually impaired. It was redesigned in the 1990s to become
a garden that engaged all the senses. Designers engaged with roughly
500 people to determine which features would be most inclusive for the
park. Within the sensory garden there is the “Garden of the Kitchen,” the
“Garden of Sound,” the “Garden of Colour,” and the “Garden of Scent.”

89
 Raised planting beds Easy access to touch and engage with a
myriad of plants and water features

Displays Tactile, easy to understand and learn from

them
Touch

Daquan Pond Coolness from the water

Raised pool Cool

Sculptures Smooth, cold

Throughout the garden Birds chirping, insects buzzing

Garden of Sound Musical; clay pots buried in the soil make

different sounds when water drips on them
Sound

Grassland Fresh, herbal

Plant beds Fragrant, floral, sweet

Garden of smell Fragrant, floral, sweet, earthy

Smell

Garden of the Kitchen Earthy, herbal, sweet, fresh

Taste

90
 The Garden of Five Senses
Pradeep Sachdeva Architects
Delhi, India

A landmark in Delhi, The Garden of Five Senses was designed to create

engagement between humans and nature. Built in 2003, the park
encompasses a wide range of activities, from contemplation and relaxation,
to cultural events and shopping.

91
 Sculptures of different Touch the sculpture to experience the
materials texture of different materials

Pathways Gritty, smooth, level, bumpy

Touch

Khas Bagh (the spiral Winding, steady, smooth

walkway)

Water features Cool atmosphere

Grassland Herbal, fresh

Gardens Fragrant, floral, herbal, sweet, fresh

In-park restaurants Aromatic, all encompassing

Sound

Bell trees Singing of bells as the wind blows through

the trees

Bamboo courtyard Quiet, still, wind

Smell

Water features Trickling, splashing of the fountains

In-park restaurants Salty, sweet, spicy, bitter, sour

Taste

92
 Eins + Alles-Experience Field of the
Senses
Welzheim, Germany

Wholly inspired by Hugo Kükelhaus’s Experience Field of the Senses pavilion

that he designed for Expo 67, this park engages with both restoration and
play through the senses. Located in a natural reserve, there are 80 sensory
stations designed for individuals to engage with natural elements and the
senses.

93
 The Wicker Cathedral Smoothness of the willow tree

The Miracle Path Different walking experiences of wood,

metal, stone
Touch

The Fire Tent Heat, warmth

Forest of Balance Balanced, light, weightlessness

Animal Kingdom Sounds of camels, donkeys, sheep, goats,

bees, and many other animals

The Wicker Cathedral Rustling of the wind blowing through

willow trees
Sound

The Fire Tent Crackling of wood burning

Red Axis Echoes, reverberation

The Fire Tent Smoky, smell of campfire, roasted food

Coffee Roastery Roasted coffee, toasty

Smell

Coffee Roastery Sweet, bitter

Taste

94
 Crown Sky Garden
Mikyoung Kim
Chicago, United States

Located on the 23rd storey of Chicago’s Children’s Hospital, the Crown Sky
Garden was built to be a space for healing. A great deal of research was
conducted prior to its design, establishing links between access to nature
and healthy recovery. The indoor design examines how green space may
be accessible and restorative for all.

95
 Resin Wall Smooth

Reclaimed wood seating Smooth

Bubbler Fountain Bubbly, bumpy, cool

Touch

Bamboo Grove Smooth, soft

River Rock Rough, gritty

Resin Wall Interactive sound

Bubbler Fountain Bubbling sound of water

Center of garden Musical performances, echoes

Sound

Reclaimed wood sculptures Pine, resinous

Bamboo Grove Fresh, herbal

Smell

96
 The Elizabeth and Nona Evans
Restorative Garden
Dirtworks Landscape Architects
Cleveland, United States

A component of the Cleveland Botanical Garden, the Elizabeth and Nona

Evans Restorative Garden was created to be a space of accessibility,
education, restoration, and comfort. Built in 1998, the garden is divided into
three parts: the Contemplative Garden, the Horticultural Therapy Garden,
and the Garden for Learning and Exploring.

97
 Pathway Comfortable width and paving to allow
for all types of mobility to move smoothly
throughout each space

Horticultural therapy garden Planting beds were made at levels that

Touch

could be touched and engaged with by

people who use wheelchairs

Stone walls Gritty, rough, smooth

Railings Braille inserts have been added to the

outer edge of the railing with a poem

Grass lawn Soft, comfortable

Throughout the gardens Birds chirping and insects buzzing

Garden for learning and Trickling water, exciting, lively

exploring
Sound

Contemplative garden Peaceful, quiet

Horticultural therapy garden Floral, herbal, fresh; the basil walk is

all consuming in its herbal smell, with a
variety of basil plants lining the pathway.
Smell

Grass lawn Grassy, herbal, earthy

Rose Garden Fragrant, floral, sweet

98
 References
AHTAVideos. (2008, November 9). The William E. Carter School Sensory Garden Classroom
[video]. YouTube. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ouC2a4LhQM

American Society of Landscape Architects. (2006). General Design Award of Honor:

The Elizabeth & Nona Evans restorative garden. Retrieved from https://www.asla.org/
awards/2006/06winners/294.html

American Society of Landscape Architects. (2013). The Crown Sky Garden: Ann and Robert H.
Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago. Retrieved from https://www.asla.org/2013awards/374.html

Château Villandry. (n.d.). The History of Villandry. Retrieved from https://www.chateauvillandry.fr/

en/explore/the-history-of-villandry/

David Berarducci Landscape Architecture. (n.d.). W. E. Carter School Sensory Garden. Retrieved
from http://www.db-la.com/w.e.%20carter%20school.htm

Dirtworks Landscape Architecture. (n.d.). Elizabeth and Nona Evans Restorative Garden. Retrieved
from https://dirtworks.us/portfolio/99-elizabeth-nona-evans-restorative-garden-2/

Eins + Alles. (n.d.). Places. Retrieved from https://www.eins-und-alles.de/orte

Faghih, N., & Sadeghy, A. (2012). Persian gardens and landscapes. Architectural Design, 82(3),
38-51. doi: 10.1002/ad.1403

Falcondale, J. (2017). A Hard Lesson in Garden Design from Château Villandry. Retrieved from
https://falcondalelife.com/garden-design-chateau-villandry/

George B. Henderson Foundation. (n.d.). Special Projects: Sensory Garden. Retrieved from http://
thehendersonfoundation.com/sensory_garden.htm

Guidento. (2016, August 9). Garden Five Sense Delhi Tourist Attractions [video]. YouTube. Retrieved
from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KF5YDy3oKtA

Henshaw, V (2014). Urban Smellscapes: Understanding and Designing City Smell Environments.
New York, NY: Routledge.

Holmes, D. (2013). Crown Sky Garden, Mikyoung Kim Design. World Landscape Architect.
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kim-design/

Jackson, M. (2020). Hidcote: An Arts and Crafts-Inspired Garden. Retrieved from https://
mikejackson1948.blog/2020/04/01/hidcote-an-arts-and-craft-inspired-garden/

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Chapter 4
Becoming Multisensorial
103
 SEE
Sketching is fundamental to our development as designers. It trains us to see and appreciate
the details of an existing object, a space, or a building from different views and angles.
Sketching teaches us how to analyze the existing environment and to critically see and
judge one’s own design ideas. This skill is called visual literacy.

“Seeing is a necessary prelude to visual expression” write Norman Crowe and Paul
Laseau (Crowe & Laseau, 1984, p. 7), whose prolific book on visual literacy (Visual Notes
for Architects and Designers, 1984) describes the importance of developing visual literacy.
The authors describe visual literacy as: “two skills-visual acuity and visual expression”
(Crowe and Laseau, 1984, p. 6). They continue to explain the importance of learning to
see, which they call visual acuity, described as: “an intense ability to see information or
multiple messages in one’s environment with clarity and accuracy” (Crowe and Laseau,
1984, p. 6).

Before we explore different ways of visual sensing and recording, let us first simply consider
the verb “sketching.” Sketching describes the physical act of putting pen to paper and
conveying what one sees in the expanded or detailed sense of seeing. Its physicality,
moving your hand along a piece of paper as you visually engage with the object or site
in question, is an important aspect to sketching. As Eric Jenkins writes, “sketching in situ is a
bodily interaction with the building, site or object…it is necessary to learn from the world by
engaging in its reality, its material, volume, its smell, its temperature” (2013, p. 46).

However, what we visually see in front of our eyes and how we interpret the word “visual”
will determine if the sketch is either a referential sketch or an analytical sketch. The word
“visual” in sketching refers to the two ways that we see with our eyes. The first is to record
what can be seen and experienced immediately in front of our eyes, known as referential
or representational sketching. The second is to record what cannot be seen immediately in
front of our eyes, a process called analytical sketching.

104
 4.1
An analytical sketch of a building (top) vs. a
referential sketch, drawn by the author, 2020

105
 There are three classifications of drawing: (1) referential, with a recording function of the
past, like a survey; (2) analytical, for example construction details, anticipates the future; (3)
design drawings which are a condensation of past and future possibilities (Leatherbarrow,
1998, p. 52). Design drawings are not covered extensively in this book. We are focussed
on referential and analytical drawings to practice seeing during recording and analysis.

For example, you are looking at a home that has a façade with five windows, a door,
and a pitched roof. A referential sketch would depict what you can see directly before
you, so in this instance you would sketch the façade. An analytical sketch however would
delve deeper and begin to dissect what is going on beyond the façade. For instance, how
might we be able to determine how many floors or rooms the building has? This can only
be determined by observing the position of the windows in the façade being in a row or
above each other. This observation triggers an analytical thinking process which the brain
infers from looking at the façade. Only through the sketcher’s trained knowledge of being
able to judge the building height and observing the position of the windows above each
other, can the observer determine, or rather analyze, if it is a single or double story building.
Analytical drawing takes on an anticipatory role, perceiving hidden dynamics like how
the interior structure of the building works, or how people might engage with the building.

Before learning analytical sketching, it is recommended to first practice referential sketching.

Developing skills in line drawing and recognizing proportions and ratios through referential
sketching will train the sketcher’s eyes and brain to be more comfortable with analytical
sketching. The following exercises practice this.

Throughout the exercises, it is important to engage the other senses beyond the visual,
particularly in the analytical sketching process. It is essential to be alert to sound, taste,
touch, and smell. Every building, site, and object will embody a myriad of sensorial
experiences, and it is our hope that mindfulness is practiced as you work through the
exercises highlighted in this book.

A note on hand drawing vs. digital drawing

Research has shown that using tablets “does not compromise” one’s ability to learn
sketching and hand drawing, and that they in fact provide a space for practicing the same
hand-mechanical gestures that would be utilized in paper sketching. In fact, it has been
shown that tablets are particularly helpful due to their “mobility and convenience” (Eiliat
& Pusca, 2013, p. 135). For example, recording and animating hand drawings is good
practice for communicating ideas in studio to a larger audience, or to a client or partner.
While we want to encourage students to hand draw in the early stages of design as much
as possible, we also recognize the value of technology to ease this process.

106
 4.2
Porsche Street in
Wolfsburg, Germany,
drawn by the author
2004
107
 Referential Sketching
Seeing the environment with our eyes happens intuitively when sketching it. The
documentation process that happens during this process helps designers to see and
interpret the world around them in a purposeful way. Sketching is an indispensable method
for learning to see accurately, and helps develop “visual acuity, which in turn develops
visual expression” (Crowe & Laseau, 1984, pp. 6-7). Thus, seeing and sketching are the
two ingredients needed for referential sketching.

When becoming a designer, referential sketching is one of the foundational skills which
should be acquired in order to develop visual or multisensorial literacy. In the past, artists
and designers would be encouraged to travel to new places to develop and practice their
drawing and documentation skills through the act of sketching. The Grand Tour was a great
example of this, in which European architects and landscape architects were required to
travel throughout Europe to sketch landscapes and architecture of great European cities.
The architect Michael Graves describes this in his magnificent book Images of a Grand
Tour (2016), where he reinterprets the Grand Tour in his own journey through Europe in the
1960s.

Referential sketching is learned through continuous practice not only in education but also
as a professional. The more you practice, the easier it becomes to look at a space and
determine how you might begin to portray it visually. Much in the same way as physical
exercise, referential sketching is a process of training your brain to make “the hand and the
eye learn to work together” (Jenkins, 2013, p. 28). With more and more practice, it will feel
easier and more comfortable for you to focus less on how something will be sketched and
more on what will be sketched. As Jenkins writes, “…we can move beyond thinking about
sketching to thinking through sketching” (2013, p. 30). Practicing referential sketching will
help with analytical sketching later on when sketching becomes an exploratory tool, and
later on when sketching helps in developing designs.

Before getting started with exercises it should be noted that the assignments provided here
focus on learning and practicing seeing the world around us using the skill of sketching.
The initial focus in practicing referential sketching should be on clarity, rather than accracy,
this will come later with practice. New sketchers should try not to be inhibited by perfectly
representing the scene right away. They should practice loosening up by drawing multiple
sketches of the same scene without trying to be too accurate. Readers taking on these
assignments should be comfortable and knowledgeable with the following basic drawing
skills: orthographic drawing in plan view, sections, elevation, axonometric, isometric, and
perspectival drawing. There are many resources available which teach orthographic and
perspective drawing (refer to list at the end of this chapter).

108
109
 Exercise 1: Time to Align
From urban design to landscape architecture to industrial design, drawing decisive and
accurate lines is one the most important skills to develop. Whether the sketch is of a tree,
a house, or a coffee maker, the line is the foundation of the drawing. Lines are not easy!
Lines, while seemingly easy, can be difficult to get right. This first exercise proposes a series
of small activities to familiarize yourself with hand drawing and get used to putting pencil
to paper.

1. Practice drawing straight lines. Start with one, then five, then 20. Create grids;
have them intersect; make them parallel to one another; draw some from an
angle. Repeat until you fill a page.

2. As you start to get used to drawing lines, start to give them a story. Choose
ten adjectives. Choose ten feelings. If you have one line to draw, how can
you convey each word? What does a mysterious line look like? What does
a delicious line look like? Repeat until you fill a page.

3. Choose a space near your home, preferably a green or open space. Walk
through the space and look around you. Take note of the light, the texture, the
colours. Take note of your feelings in the space. Write these down. How might
you visually describe what you are seeing? Try to convey your experience
using lines—start with how you might convey the space using just one line,
then two lines, ten lines, and 20 lines.

4.3 (left)
Line Practice, Marissa
Campbell, 2020

110
 4.4
Line Personality, Yaying
Zhou, 2020

111
 4.5
Line personality,
Wenwen Zhuang,
2020

112
 4.6
Sahalli Park in lines,
Marissa Campbell, 2020
113
114
 4.7
A series of cubes,
Jenna Ratzlaff,
2018
115
 Exercise 2: Adding Dimension
For this next exercise we jump from the first dimension (a line), to dimensions two (a square
or circle) and three (a cube or sphere). After having practiced sketching with lines, it is next
important to learn to think and draw in the third dimension. This skill is essential as designers
explore and design three-dimensionally at all scales.

This exercise trains visual acuity through basic three-dimensional sketching and then applies
three-dimensional sketching to see and document urban space. From as basic as a cube to
as complex as conveying a built form for example, a church with a bell tower or a concert
hall, you will look beyond the single line and start to imagine how lines can convey the
third dimension.

1. Draw a basic cube. Imagine where the light would be placed on it. Begin
to shade the cube to convey this.

2. Draw many different sized cubes. Draw a series of either axonometric or

perspective cubes and have them overlap, intersect with, or hide other cubes.
Afterwards, imagine where the light would be and shade accordingly.
Repeat until you fill a half of a page.

3. Repeat this exercise with another basic shape of your choice.

4. Examine an object in your home. How would you begin to draw it three-
dimensionally? Where does the light hit?

5. Choose a space near your home. How might you start to understand this
space through drawing? Start by specifying what you think are the vital
components to the space—note the lines, geometries, or shapes that stand
out.

6. Try setting your drawing to a timer. Draw the space in 30 seconds, and then
one minute, two minutes, five minutes, 15 minutes, and 30 minutes.

116
 4.8
Basic shape exploration,
Yaying Zhou, 2020

117
 4.9
Simple object in sxpace,
Kathryn Pierre, 2020

118
 30 seconds

1 minute

5 minutes

119
 15 minutes

30 minutes

4.10
Timed sketching, Wenwen
Zhuang, 2020

120
 4.11
Space visualized to design
landscape by looking
at architectural working
drawings, drawn by the
author, 1995

121
 Analytical Sketching

“…sketching helps us to learn from what is into what may be” (Jenkins, 2013, p. 46).

The previous exercises practiced developing our understanding of how to document what
is. In the following sketching exercises, we will move beyond this to examine what may be.

Once you start to feel familiar with referential sketching, analytical sketching is the natural
next step. As Crowe and Laseau write, “analytical sketching records what cannot be seen
by the camera” (1984, p. 2). These kinds of sketches aim to make the invisible visible.
Analytical sketching is essentially like an x-ray machine; it visualizes the bones, muscles, and
tendons under the skin and how they function together. In spatial design, analytical sketches
can begin to depict anything from how sound hits a wall, to how a wood frame can hold up
a building. Like referential sketching, analytical sketching needs to be practiced throughout
one’s design career. It takes some practice, but once you are able to think and draw
spaces analytically, a whole new world opens up.

Analytical sketching requires more deep thinking than referential sketching, and thus even
more coordination between the eye and the hand. Seeing analytically must be trained
“often in stages” (Jenkins, 2013, p. 39). While a seemingly slow process, sketching in stages
will help to develop this skillset in a way that you will eventually enable you to interpret and
draw even the most minute of details.

Analytical drawing is a research tool (Have & van den Toorn, 2012, p. 75; Unwin, 2007,
p. 102). Drawing is thinking in action; it is a tool for observing, investigating, understanding,
and creating. The beauty of a hand sketch versus a photo or a recording is that as the
drawer you need to actively participate in the space you are in. The visualized, drawn
analysis of what we are engaging with gives us more insight, igniting our imagination and
allowing us to begin to think of different ways to engage, problem solve, and design.

The following exercises act as methods for you to begin to understand how to think and
draw analytically.

122
 4.12
Analysis of the Beaty
Biodiversity Museum
in Vancouver, Canada,
Mingjia Chen, 2018

123
 Exercise 3: Mapping
“Escaping this flatland is the essential task of envisioning information—for all the interesting
worlds (physical, biological, imaginary, human) that we seek to understand are inevitably
and happily multivariate in nature. Not flatlands.” (Tufte, 1990, p. 12).

This exercise requires us to create maps of different scales and different information.
Mapping, while often seen solely in a geographic sense, is a recording tool that allows us
to highlight data and information in a spatially coherent way. For instance, an Ordinance
Survey map shows what has been surveyed in plan view, like buildings, property lines,
fields, ditches, tress, powerlines, etc. To use it analytically, one could begin to interpret and
represent underground gas pipes. This would then help to determine where not to position
a building, to avoid a gas pipe under the building’s foundation, reducing maintenance
accessibility and safety concerns. Another example could be reading and analyzing the
contours, the gradient of the land, on a map. This kind of analysis would determine the
surface rainwater runoff from a site and what plant species could live in the different zones
of a sloped site with contours dictating plant species. For instance, the zones at the bottom
of the site will have a higher moisture content than those at the top, and therefore allow for
plant communities tolerating or needing more water to survive.

A critique that often comes with maps is how they are represented in a way that does not
employ dimensionality. Data scientist Edward Tufte discusses this at length, and wonders
how can elements of the world around us can be mapped in ways that are more engaging
than the conventional plan? In this exercise you are tasked with exploring the world around
you and finding phenomena that you would like to analyze and map in a way that expresses
dimensionality. You should try to rethink the traditional map in plan-view and develop your
own maps to document movement in buildings, a process on a site (in the landscape), or
engaging an object’s conditions (a machine), thereby trying to sketch at all scales.

1. Choose a space near you that you can return to from time to time, preferably
a space that has a lot of activity, and bonus points if there is a good spot for
you to sit and observe. This can be anything from a museum, to a concert
hall, to your local park. Some of the things that you could begin to observe;
The movement of a flower during a day
The flow of people in the space
The colours of the sky
Topography
The meadow’s relationship to the building
The movement of living beings throughout a space
How trees or plants move in the wind
Note that this assignment does not necessarily need to be hand drawn, but it is
highly recommended that you start sketching in situ and then try using digital or
modelling tools afterwards if you feel called to do so.

124
 4.13
Barnacle clustering at
different tides, Marissa
Campbell, 2020

125
 4.14
Cloud mapping, Kathryn
Pierre, 2020

126
 4.15
“What is happening along the Wild Pacific Trail, in and under the forest?
The presence of exposed bedrock indicates that the soil depth throughout
the forest could be limited, determining what types of plants grow where
and how much water they might receive. This section considers how the
exposed rock sometimes interrupts the trail system, and usually can only
host small species such as mosses and ferns,” Marissa Campbell, 2020

127
 Exercise 4: Above, At, and Below Ground
The next exercise prompts you to think about how space functions. In any space, there are
a multitude of things happening around you—even if you might not necessarily be able to
see them. This exercise entails speculating and analyzing the invisible and seeing the system
it is a part of.

1. Choose a space that you can access easily. We recommend looking at

a space that spans a block or is generally large in scale, for instance a
university campus, a shopping mall, or a commercial street downtown. Begin
to break down the space by examining the following scales and their cues;

- Above ground
What are the building heights?

How do they relate to the trees? To the birds? To the sky?

Where does the rain go when it hits the building? Does the
building or its landscape do anything to deal with water? How
could you describe this in a diagram?

Where does the sun reflect? How might that look from the inside?
Are there shaded areas?

- Ground level
How and where do people move through the space? How do
vehicles move through the space?

What kind of plants are there, if any? What is their relationship

to the street? What is their relationship and scale to your body?

Can you interact with the built form? If so, how?

- Underground
Imagine the types of systems that may be operating beneath
your feet—utilities, water drainage, root systems. How might you
convey the intricacies of the invisible underground? How far
down do these systems go?

Note that this assignment does not necessarily need to be hand drawn, but it
is highly recommended that you start sketching in situ and then try using digital
or modelling tools afterwards if you feel called to do so.

128
 4.16
Examining the flow of water, Wenwen
Zhuang, 2020

129
 4.17
Analysis of the floor levels of the
AMS Building at UBC in Vancouver,
Canada, Jenna Ratzlaff, 2018
130
 4.18
Polaroid from a site visit in Orick, California,
Michelle Gagnon-Creeley, 2019
131
 Photography
“Seeing as a way of knowing and photography as a medium of thought” (Whiston Spirn,
2014, p. 114).

Photography serves as a record of the seeing process. The term photography is derived
from Greek words photos, which means light, and graphe, which means to write, resulting
in the direct translation “writing of light”. The term graphe could also be interpreted as a tool
or instrument of recording. The world has been constantly recorded through photographs
since the camera’s invention in 1839, as Susan Sontag wrote, “about everything has been
photographed, or so it seems” (1973, p. 1). This inventory has only increased exponentially
with digital photography becoming a tool that is easily accessible to anyone, and with free
sharing platforms such as Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, and Flickr allowing anyone from
around the world to post their work. What would Sontag say today about these digital
platforms? In the past, photography was “essentially an act of non-intervention” (Sontag,
1973, p. 8), but digital photography has changed this. Photos are no longer specific
documents depicting a specific day, time and light exposure anymore; digital photography
has allowed for the possibility of taking more shots as well as having images digitally
altered.

Photography is everywhere now, and digitization has made it an instant tool. Images can
now be heavily manipulated away from reality with photo-rendering software. Digital tools
allow for an even wider range of control in photography. Focus and exposure can be
modified instantly just by touching some buttons. With that, one has the ability of even more
evidence recording than analog cameras did.

Visual thinking, writes landscape architect and scholar Anne Whiston Spirn, can be learned
“through the practice of looking, drawing, photographing, seeking and studying patterns,
selecting images and arranging them in series and sequences” (2014, pp. 117-118). In
the past, information was mostly recorded by writing, but the distribution of photographic
images, first analog and now digital “provides possibilities of recording” (Sontag, 1973,
p. 122). As Sontag writes, “photography meant note-taking on potentially everything in the
world, from every possible angle” (Sontag, 1973, pp. 137-138). For Spirn, photography
is much more than recording—she sees the camera as a thinking tool (2014, p. xi). One
of the potentials of photography lies in recording the experience of time and space in an
image (Whiston Spirn, 2014, p. 38). For example, early photographs of the Swiss Alps
taken in different years from the same position visually document the rapid melting of the
glaciers due to climate change. This photographic record inspires visual thinking, as in the
synthesis of rising temperature data and visual proof of snow and ice melt, confirming the
detrimental ecological impact on the landscape. Without this photographic record, the
impact would not be felt quite as dramatically. It is only a series of images such as these that
can convey the change that is occurring. While we can write or draw this phenomenon,
nothing will compare to, or will have as much of an effect on us as, the photo. Photography
is a record of the seeing experience. Whiston Spirn writes “to photograph mindfully, is to
look and think, to open a door between what can be seen directly and what is hidden”
(2014, p. 113). These seeing and interpreting skills form a language that can be learned
and practiced in the same way as we learn a language.

132
 4.19
Landscape types in Haida Gwaii,
Canada, Michelle Gagnon-
Creeley, 2019
133
 Photography is a visual thinking tool that provides great possibilities to practice visual
literacy. Photography is much more accessible today with the advent of technology such as
smart phones, aerial photography, and drone technology. More angles and lenses to see
with are more available than ever before. Easy access to photographic tools can be used
in combination with detailed survey maps (topography, rivers, vegetation, geological).
Whiston Spirn explains that through this kind of an analysis we are able to perceive what
the space was and could be (2014, p. 117). Photography can be used at all scales, from
an object, to a building, to a region. Photographs also serve as a historical record that
we can build upon. For instance, recorded evidence of the past is important to conserve
a building’s design or to develop it for further use. Knowing the use of different building
materials in historic buildings or plant species in historic gardens can assist in developing
new designs that can reference what exists or could be improved upon. Photography is
much more than a recording tool—it initiates visual and critical thinking as the photographer
reads the images they create. Whiston Spirn writes, “to see a place in terms the processes
that produce them is to read past and future in the present, to distinguish artifacts from
portents, and to plan the future wisely” (2014, p. 117).

Walter Benjamin wisely says in his essay A Short History of Photography, “the illiterate
of the future, will not be the man who cannot read but the one who cannot take a
photograph…but must we not also count as illiterate the photographer who cannot read his
own pictures?” (1931, p. 25). Photography can only act as a visual thinking tool in design
if visual literacy is taught and practiced. While Benjamin wrote this prediction nearly 100
years ago, his warning is just as relevant today. With the dramatic changes that we are
seeing in our environments, it is imperative as designers that we become experts at reading
and understanding the world around us—our communities depend on it (Whiston Spirn,
2014, p. 117).

The following exercises try to train us to see what is around us and recording it with a
camera to begin the visual thinking process.

134
 4.20
Exercise summary,
Berend Kessler, 2020

135
 Exercise 5: Seeing > Visual Thinking > Idea
For this exercise you will photograph a series of images that will train your seeing and
visual thinking skills to create and visualize your own idea. This exercise can be done at
all scales, from an object to a region, however, we recommend starting small first. For this
exercise you will need a camera and your sketchbook. It is important that the visual thinking
process be annotated.

1. Take a walk in your neighbourhood and observe different plants (such as

trees, shrubs, ground cover, etc.) or building details (doors, windows, fences,
roofs, stairs). There is no need to photograph your chosen theme just yet.

2. Choose one of these elements that you would like to study deeper. Some
examples include: doors, public seating, paving patterns, or fences.

3. When you have chosen your theme, you may use your camera to take
images of this element when you see it. Be sure to try different angles to see
and study the individual object in detail. Later on, you may even want to
look at aerial images depending on the scale of the chosen object.

4. Group similar objects and angles that you have photographed and lay
them out side by side to compare (printing your photos or using a table
will be easier for the rest of the activity). As an example, if we were looking
at doorways, some groupings could be entrance doors with windows, no
windows, different shapes and sizes of windows, doors made of wood, or
metal, etc. Group them by themes.

Can you recognize similar patterns? For example, different positions

of the windows in entrance doors or different door handles and
keyholes?

Can you recognize different forms? For example, window form with
or without glazing bars, and what forms have the glazing bars?

5. Annotate or sketch on the poster using tracing paper or your tablet if you
recognize similarities. Try to account the decision of your chosen series
by annotating. Don’t be afraid to take notes on this assignment! Develop
reasons why these patterns are happening or as Whiston Spirn describes it
“plot a line of reasoning” (2014, p. 46).

6. Repattern! Now try to reinterpret your chosen object, based on the patterns
or differences you recognized. Combine the details in the images to
develop and express new ideas. This new idea can be represented by
annotated hand drawings and diagrams or collaged digitally.

136
 4.21
An analysis of
neighbourhood book
exchanges and a
proposed new structure,
Yette Gram, 2020

137
138
139
Colour

Pull

Depth

Slide
 4.22
An analysis of drawers,
and a proposed new
cabinet, Vicky Cen,
2020

140
141
 Exercise 6: Time Stamp
This exercise looks at the element of time, and how we might produce a series of photographs
to depict how something changes over a day, a week, a season, or a year.

1. Take a walk in your neighbourhood, preferably somewhere close enough

to you that you can engage with the chosen object or site multiple times.

2. Choose an object or site that you would like to observe over time and think
about the time intervals for which you would like to set. For instance, how a
plant might change in the span of a day or a week, how the seasons affect a
certain site, or how and where people interact with a space on a weekday.

3. Take photos of the same thing over your previously decided time interval.
Annotate these photos. What are you noticing? What has changed? What
has not changed?

4.23 (left)
The evolution of a sunrise,
Michelle Gagnon-Creeley,
2020

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 TOUCH
Touch drives design; the skin and its relationship to space is the most important sense to be
explored in the design process. Touch, Pallasmaa writes, is “the mother of all senses…the
parent of our eyes, ears, nose and mouth…it is the sense which became differentiated into
the others” (2005, p. 11). In the animal kingdom, touch is the most primal sense used, from
protection to finding food. In fact, many animals’ non-visual sensorial abilities are far more
refined than our own. While touch might not be seen to be as vital to us, touch plays an
important role in a human’s physical and mental wellbeing (Ackerman, 1990, pp. 94-95).
Like other animals, touch is our most primal sense. As babies, our first sensorial explorations
are through touch. This emphasizes that the skin is the first way that we start to see-skin is
seeing physically.

It is important to understand that buildings, landscapes, and objects are not experienced
solely as “a series of isolated retinal pictures, but in its fully integrated material, embodied and
spiritual essence” (Pallasmaa, 2005, p. 12). Since the Renaissance, the visual experience
has been placed as the sense of most importance while touch was considered the least
important (Pallasmaa, 2005, pp. 15-16). The invention of the one-point perspective during
the Renaissance made the eye the focal point of how we see and interpret the world before
us, and we continue to work primarily from this perspective today (Pallasmaa, 2005, p. 16).
During the Renaissance, the eye was the dominant organ in designing cities and buildings,
with cities like Sabbioneta, Italy being designed to please the eye from a central point of
view. Due to this hierarchy of the visual sense, modernism and most contemporary Western
architecture and design have neglected the body and the other senses (Pallasmaa, 2005,
p. 17). Vision tends to operate automatically and “supplant touch as the dominant sense”
(Landau, 2018, p. 177). It is worth noting however that non-Western architecture has not
necessarily followed this approach, with Pallasmaa noting that “indigenous clay and
mud architecture…seem to be born of the muscular and haptic senses more than the eye”
(2005, p. 26). Western architecture has also had some notable deviations to more touch-
oriented design and included “a multitude of sensory experiences” in their buildings by such
architects as Frank Lloyd Wright, Alvar Alto, Steven Holl, Peter Zumthor, and Glen Murcutt
(Pallasmaa, 2005, p. 70).

144
 4.24
Understanding a seashelll through
touch, Marissa Campbell, 2020

145
 To design with touch in mind is more important now than ever before. Our dependence
on our phones has created a society disconnected from tactile experiences outside of our
devices. Designers should take on the responsibility of inclusive design. Visually impaired
individuals are often excluded in the visual experience, but we can avoid this if we focus
our design on touch along with the other senses. What might be the lessons or designs
that come forth when we work with blindfolds? As we increasingly use devices with touch
screens our skin becomes much more than “exterior skin” (Lupton, 2018a, p. 38). Our
fingers are now capable of instantly accessing, gaining, and manipulating information;
“we now touch information itself: we stretch, crumple, drag, flick it aside…the illusion of
direct interaction changes the way we experience the digital world” (Lupton, 2018a, p. 41).

How a space feels to our bodies is arguably the most important consideration in design.
A bench that is made of stone or of wood will feel different to our bodies. As Catherine
Dee writes, “wet and dry stone smell different…and stone reflects sound; clatters with hard
shoe soles, while earth muffles it”. (2001, p. 199). Materiality is the gateway for creating
the ambience of a space, for evoking physical and emotional feelings, for touching the
soul. While the focus on materiality often goes to manmade materials, plant life is also
extremely important to consider. Walking barefoot on grass is a very different experience
from walking barefoot on asphalt. We know these things unconsciously, however, the
following exercises will begin to make you start to interpret the world before you without
using your eyes. This is where you need to start to listen and be mindful of your body and
how it moves and feels space.

146
 4.25
An exploration of the feeling of a
random object, Valia Puente, 2018

147
 Exercise 7: Using our hands
The first assignment will have you rely on the body part that is most familiar with touch—your
hands.

1. Have someone fill a box with objects for you; you should be unaware of
what the box is filled with.

2. Closing your eyes or wearing a blindfold, choose an unidentified object

from the box.

3. Feel the object. Rather than trying to determine what the object is, focus on
how it feels in your hand.

4. Try to draw the object. Some prompts as you draw:

What does the object feel like?
Is it hot or cold?
Is it smooth, gritty, hard, soft, rubbery, etc.?
Does the material of the object feel familiar?

Does the object feel comfortable in your hand? Where do your

fingers fall? How does it fit in your palm?

How can you convey the feeling of it? If you are stuck on this,
write down words that you would use to describe the feeling. If
you were to illustrate these words, what would that look like?

5. Try to repeat this exercise without the blindfold. Are there differences or
similarities in how you treat and feel the object?

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149
 4.26
An exploration of a bug light,
Jennifer Reid, 2020

150
151
 4.27
The re-creation of a
tactile experience of
an unknown object,
Mingjia Chen, 2018

152
 4.28
Drawing on a tactile
board, adapted from
The Senses: Design
Beyond Vision, drawn
by the author, 2020

153
 Exercise 8: Drawn to Touch
This exercise is inspired by Steven Landau’s “Drawing by Touching” chapter in The Senses:
Design beyond Vision. Landau describes how visually impaired artists draw using “tactile
drawing boards” that are made with a soft rubber mat placed under a sheet of paper.
Applying pressure with a pen, this mat creates depressed furrows in the paper which
can be felt by one of the drawer’s hands while the other hand draws the image (Landau,
2018, p. 177). Firm pressure on the pen creates deeper raised furrows in the paper, which
expresses thicker and darker lines while soft pressure creates lower raised furrows in the
paper expressing thinner and grey lines (Landau, 2018, p. 177). Through touch, the artist
can then express themselves through drawing (Landau, 2018, p. 177).

This whole drawing experience is vital to facilitate drawing inclusion of the visually impaired
and it stimulates the tactile experience to include touch intentionally in the observation and
design process of buildings, site, and objects.

In this exercise you will need to buy a couple of rubber pads a bit larger than the paper
sizes you anticipate using with varying types of softness and resilience. We recommend
different types of hardness so that the pressure while drawing will create different textures.

1. Set up your tactile board, placing your mat underneath your paper. Blindfold
yourself. Similar to the previous exercise, we want you to learn to draw
without visual perception. Leave the blindfold on for the whole exercise
session, so the brain does not revert immediately back to visual mode.

2. Try to draw lines on the board, press softly first and then harder to draw
thin and thick and then thin. Feel the lines you have just drawn and do not
remove the blindfold.

3. After you feel comfortable drawing lines and other doodles, imagine an
object, a tree, a chair, or a person and draw them on the board. Feel the
result. If you feel confident draw something more complex like a building or
a path in the landscape. Most important do not remove the blindfold until
you are done.

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 Exercise 9: Tactile Body Space
In the first exercise we focused on how we might convey the tactile experience of an object,
or how a substance might feel in our hands. In this exercise we will start to look at the tactile
experience from a larger scale. This exercise will be a little more complex, in which we will
examine what it feels like to be in space.

1. Choose a space where you can sit for about an hour—this can be anywhere,
from your home, a café, a church, a university campus.

2. Start by simply sitting or standing in the space. Close your eyes and listen.
Open them and scan what is in your direct environment.

3. Begin to engage with the materials that are present. What material are the
doors, the walls, the furniture, the floors? How do these make you feel?

4. Try to convey how this space feels using words—is it smooth, gritty, hard, soft,
rubbery, etc.? Simply record what you notice and how you feel in terms of
light, sound, patterns, textures, colour, temperature, smell. Try to illustrate the
texture and feeling of the spaces or materials that are popping out to you.

5. Do these feelings you are noticing relate to the materials? Is there something
that feels cozy or cold? Why does it feel that way?

Sketch parts of the space that feel most relevant in describing the material
sensations of being there. These sketches can be diagrams, mappings,
orthographic drawings, or material collages. You can also use the video and
sound recording device on your smart phone to create tactile recordings or
animated videos explaining your tactile experiences.

4.29 (left)
Annotated sketch of a
wood bench, Jenna
Ratzlaff, 2018

156
157
 stucco walls wood furnishing

wood window frame metal guard frame

window screen wood deck tile

4.30
Exploration of the tactile experiences of
a patio, Marissa Campbell, 2020
158
 4.31
Mapping movement through a yoga
practice, Josh Fender, 2020

159
 Exercise 10: Movement
Our bodies continuously engage with the spaces that we exist in. In this exercise we
will be examining the movements that our bodies go through as they engage in space.
Choose a room, hallway, or outdoor space and begin to consciously evaluate your body’s
interactions with your chosen space.

Take, for example, the following scenario of a staircase. Consider the following questions
as your body engages with it:

How do your feet touch the ground?

Is there a pattern to the number of steps taken at a time? Do you skip steps or
take each step?

How do your legs move as you take one step at a time vs. multiple steps at a
time? How does the rest of your body move?

How does the railing feel? How do you hold the railing? Do you extend your
arm or are you close to the railing?

If you were to sit on a step, is it comfortable? Do you extend your legs or have
them at a 90° angle?

If you were to notate the steps you take in plan view, what would that look like?

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 4.32
Mapping the dynamic experience
of stairs, Vicky Cen, 2020

161
 4.33
An examination of the body’s
kinesthetic relationship to stairs,
Fabian Lobmueller, 2018

162
 4.34
Notation of a figure skating routine, Michelle
Gagnon-Creeley, 2020
163
 Exercise 11: Footwork
“Dance has been called moving architecture…” (Hutchinson Guest, 1990, p. 203)

Dancers and figure skaters annotate their choreography on paper in ways that are visually
beautiful and spatially aware. They are maps in their own right, recording graphically how
and where the body and feet should be—where one should travel to, how one should
place their feet, what kind of movement is taking place. In this exercise we would like you
to try and map where and how you move in a space and interpret that on paper.

1. Find an open space where you can move around or dance, preferably a
park or an open space.

2. Move through the space—walk, run, skip, dance, let your body move freely.
Feel free to listen to music while you do this!

3. Record where and how you moved. Some prompts:

Can you map where you moved? What does this look like in plan
view? Where did you travel?

How do you distinguish a step from a swirl? A hop from a skip? What
does a pause look like?

Let’s examine this three-dimensionally, how might this look like from an
axonometric view?

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 HEAR
“Architecture shapes sound–and sound shapes architecture” (Lupton, 2018a, p. 49).

Imagine sitting in a café or on a busy bus. Close your eyes and listen. Without seeing, can
you visualize what the space might look like in your mind? Vibrations guide our ears much
like how light guides our eyes.

“Sound transforms what we see” (Mau, 2018, p. 23); an echo can measure distance in
space, and the vibrations of music can affect the skin to the point of giving us goosebumps.
These vibrations engage with our bodies in ways that can conjure vivid emotional or
psychological responses. Much like smell, sound is complex and happens all around us,
affecting how we unconsciously experience space.

Music is often the first thing to come to mind when we consider sound, and it is something
that should be considered as a designer. Oliver Sacks writes in his book Musicophilia, “for
virtually all of us, music has a great power, whether or not we seek it out or think of ourselves
as particularly musical” (2007, pp. x-xi). Music can affect us in many ways. At times it
acts like our diary or our journal, or as the backdrop to a good conversation, or as our
motivation during strenuous times. It can recall memories of a specific time or place. Music
has a way of “engraving” itself on the brain (Sacks, 2007, p. xii). Music is also a physical
process—as Nietzsche observes “we listen to music with our muscles…not just auditory and
emotionally” (as quoted in Sachs, 2007, p. xii). Music, like sound, touches the skin through
the sound waves deflected in space, the walls, the floor, the roof, the plants, and through
the air. Unlike atmospheric sound, music is multi-faceted, stimulating not only our ears but
also our minds, triggering “sensory channels that make us think and feel, listen and touch,
see and imagine” (Bourbounne, 2018, p. 154). For people who are hard of hearing, music
is oftentimes absorbed via vibrations on the skin by touching a speaker as it plays music
(Bourbonne, 2018, p. 153).

166
 Sound often borrows from the other senses, especially when describing it—for instance using
the words “sharp” or “soft” to describe sound also conjure a physical and tactile meanings
(Copeland, 2017, p. 1). Music and sound have a tendency to evoke certain feelings or
visualizations once the vibrations hit the ear. Research over the past two decades suggests
that music could also have connections to other senses. Otherwise known as synesthesia,
it is a phenomenon that occurs when one sense relates to another (Copeland, 2017). For
instance, seeing colour or shape while listening to a song or experiencing a certain flavour
when listening to specific type of music is a type of synesthesia. While there are still a lot of
discoveries to be made, it provides interesting insight into how the senses can relate to one
another and affect a person’s perception of space. As Ellen Lupton writes, “studying sound
through visual or tactile means is a powerful method of invention” (Lupton, 2018c, p. 216).
For instance, designer Guy Featherstone graphically integrates sound into a multisensorial
experience (Lupton, 2018c, p. 212). When creating music covers for Diagonal Records,
Featherstone considers it important to design for the experience of listening to the music, not
only the sound. In order to visualize the “sonic terrain” he asks questions like “What does the
sound feel like? What does it look like? What is the experience?” (Lupton, 2018c, p. 212).
We can also see this when looking at jazz album covers from the 1960s, as they are often
a graphic and physical interpretation of what we are hearing (Lupton, 2018c, p. 216). This
type of imagery “offers a rich path for experiencing sound beyond the audible” (Lupton,
2018c, p. 216). This multi-layered questioning has also been explored physically with the
human body. Copeland describes full sensory dancing experiments at the Smithsonian, in
which participants were blindfolded and music had to felt through smell, taste, and touch
(Copeland, 2017).

On a primitive level, humans use sound to measure distance; it has been used for centuries
as an orientation tool. The echo of a captain’s whistle against a rocky coastline deflected
sharper sounds while a sandy beach created a softer sound (Westerkamp, 2007, p. 55).
Indigenous communities use hearing as a tool for hunting, interpreting the health of plants and
the forest, and for navigation. As a designer, understanding sound in space—in particular
how acoustic stimuli function and are experienced in a space is essential to design. As
Pallasmaa writes “hearing structures articulates the experience and understanding of
space” (Pallasmaa, 2005, p. 49). Every space—indoor or outdoor, urban or rural has its
own multi-layered sound experience that enhances the overall dwelling experience. These
experiences are heavily influenced by the materials used within the space—as each object
or material will create unique sounds when interacted with. To learn how to listen to the
sounds of plants, rocks, wood, or metal in relation to our bodies is important for us to begin
to understand how we design spaces for comfort, work, pleasure, or rest. Attentive listening
thus should be trained continually during one’s design career.

The city can often sound and feel like a whirlwind—as people have conversations with
one another; cars drive by; shop doors open and close, and the leaves of street trees rustle
in the wind. City life reverberates onto the buildings and street, and depending on the
materials of said structures, the sounds will be experienced differently (Pallasmaa, 2005, p.
51). Listening to the sounds in a historic European city with its narrow streets and stone or
brick buildings creates a completely different soundscape from a modern city such as Los
Angeles with its wide freeways. Historic parks with old tree growth sound different from the
High Line in New York. Sound has to be considered and designed for different contexts,
such as for buildings which are static, or for a site, a park or garden, which is in constant
change due to growth.

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 It was Raymond Murray Schafer who established the phrase soundscapes (Adams et
al., 2007, p. 1) and introduced soundwalks in the early 1970s (Henshaw, 2014, p. 42).
Soundwalks were an attempt to heighten the sensory experience in the environment
intentionally, by limiting a sense such as sight to experience sound more deeply. Since
then, research has been carried out to understand soundscapes through sound-walking.
Current research recognizes sounds can be a positive contribution to space and are
not always detrimental. Thus, sound can be a concept driver for environmental planning,
landscape architecture, and architecture (Adams et al., 2007, p. 4). Recent research by
Gunnar Cerwén et al. summarizes existing environmental design soundscape research and
proposes “soundscape actions”; a series of tools for developing sound design concepts for
the urban environment (2017).

As designers it is important that while we visit sites, we sit, listen, and absorb the multitude
of sounds that reach our ears. Pallasmaa reminds us that we often are not attuned to the
subtleties of sound in our everyday lives, writing “…we are not normally aware of the
significance of hearing spatial experiences, although sound often provides the temporal
continuum in which visual impressions are embedded” (Pallasmaa, 2005, p. 49). A movie
without sound loses its plasticity or three-dimensionality; silent movies therefore had to
exaggerate their physical expressions to compensate for the absence of sound (Pallasmaa,
2005, p. 49). Sound is everywhere and “omni-directional” while vision is “directional”—
sound surrounds and envelops us entirely in a way that the visual cannot (Pallasmaa, 2005,
p. 49). This makes sound far more complex to document and design for.

The following exercises challenge and broaden your hearing and listening abilities
to heighten your listening skills so you can begin to understand and depict your own
soundscapes.

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 Exercise 12: Tuning In
This exercise references the work of Westerkamp’s soundscapes. The goal is for you to
begin to understand the world purely through its sounds.

1. Choose a space in your neighbourhood to analyze. This could be a large

garden or park in your neighbourhood with a path system and multiple
spaces to visit, a bridge or a neighbourhood block.

2. Begin by finding a space to stand or sit and close your eyes. Start listening.
Keep note of the sounds you are experiencing—either in writing, drawing,
or an audio recording.

3. Some prompts as you tune in:

What do you hear? What do you visualize when hearing these
sounds?

Does your body make any sounds? Can you move without making
sound? Is it possible?

Is there a feeling or memory that you can associate to the sound(s)

you are hearing?

Could you attribute a colour or texture to the sound(s)?

If the sound was a physical object, what would that object look like?

What are the sources of the different sounds?

Can you detect interesting patterns, rhythms, or beats?

This exercise does not necessarily need to be hand drawn-digital or modelling
tools can also be used.

4.35
Sound analysis
of the High Line,
Kemeng Gao,
2018

170
171
 4.36
Sound analysis,of
Heather Park in
Vancouver, Canada,
Jacob Darowski, 2020

172
 4.37
Sound of typing on a keyboard
depicted through time,
communication, and muscle
memory, the blue line represents
background noise, Marissa
Campbell, 2020

173
 4.38
Acoustic impression of
sounds heard from a
balcony, Doug Craig,
2020

174
 4.39
An analysis of a
shoelace in the
wind, Wenwen
Zhuang, 2020

175
 Exercise 13: Wind Play
Westerkamp’s text describes how the sound of wind is everywhere; “voices in old myths,
in novels, in poetry, in fairytales and in horror stories” (2007, p. 49). As an exercise,
Westerkamp suggests that we “concentrate on one outstanding continuous sound (church
bells, motorboat, highway, outdoor music) and listen to the acoustic game the wind plays
with it” (Westerkamp, 2007, p. 49). Outdoor sound is carried by even the slightest amount
of wind and has immediate impact on nearby listeners. For instance, a highway or airport
sound will be heard more intensely depending on the wind’s direction in relation to the
position of the listener. Wind plays a key role when analyzing and designing sound in
urban and rural areas.

In this exercise you should build an object with which the wind can play, to explore how its
direction and intensity impacts the object’s movement and acoustical sound interacts within
the object. This object can move or can be fixed, but it must display the wind direction and
create a sound. Its sound should try to entice observers to notice its presence and it should,
if possible, improve the acoustic environment. Some prompts:

Research windmills, wind sculptures, and light structures made with light material
like paper. Study light materials such as Japanese paper and bamboo, or
feathers. The search for the construction material should be guided by the
wind’s physical properties of pressure and intensity.

Make the object and place it in a space where it can interact with wind.

Record its movement or its sounds or the relationship between them in the wind
either through sketching or digital means.

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 Love & Death, Ebo Taylor

4.40
Visualizing
songs, Michelle
Gagnon-Creeley,
2020

September, Earth, Wind & Fire

177
 Exercise 14: Album Art
Inspired by the jazz albums from the 1960s, as mentioned above, this assignment
encourages students to create an album cover or an image that best depicts a song.

1. Choose a song. This can be your favourite song, a friend’s favourite song, a
musical genre you have never listened to. Listen to the chosen song. Close
your eyes; immerse yourself. Repeat this step as many times as you need.

2. Begin to draw or write out some experiences from the song. Some prompts:
How does the music make you feel emotionally?

How does the music make you feel physically? Did you dance? Did
you feel a weight on your shoulders?

Do any memories or stories come to mind?

Do you see or feel any colours?

If you had to give the song a shape what would it look like?

If you could only use one continuous line, could you describe the
song?

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 SMELL
Smell cannot be described easily in words; it is intimate and it constantly surrounds us.
And yet while it envelops us, it is rarely a part of design discourse. Why is this so? There is
speculation that it might perhaps be because it is still seen as an unconventional subject.
Andrea Lipps writes, “smell is deeply personal” (2018b, p. 111), whereas a good smell for
one person might be repulsive to another, and this may be why designers tend to overlook
its importance in spatial design. Another consideration is that our sense of smell is often
“muted” (Ackerman, 1990, p. 6). Of all the senses, smell goes unrecognized perhaps
because there is no physical way to engage with it in the same way we do with our mouths
to taste or fingers to touch. Also smells mix, linger, and disappear in a way that the other
senses don’t. It makes it difficult to pinpoint their origins (without practice, at least). But
while it is seldomly discussed, smell is nonetheless integral to our spatial and contextual
experience.

Take for instance how smell guided us in prehistoric times; sweet smells alerted our ancestors
when fruit was ripe for consumption; musty smells communicated the need to seek cover
from approaching storms. As Lipps notes, “smell has been long the key to survival” (2018b,
p. 110). Since early evolution, smell has been integral to our survival and livelihood. Along
with touch, smell is seen as a “primal sense” (Lipps, 2018b, p. 109). While it may be hard
to understand how our sense of smell today relates to prehistoric times, think back to your
childhood home—are there certain smells from then that you can still recall? The smell of
freshly washed sheets, the smell of your father’s rosebush that he so delicately pruned, the
smell of cookies baking in the oven. Smell experiences from childhood can be locked in
one’s brain for a lifetime and can come surging back as though no time has passed. Many
writers and researchers agree that smell is the most memorable sense (Ackerman, 1990, p.
5; Pallasmaa, 2005, p. 54; Lipps, 2018b, p. 113). Smell affects space. “Every dwelling has
its individual smell of home” writes Pallasmaa (2005, p. 54).

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 How we perceive and design for smell varies from culture to culture. In Western culture,
smell (and to a certain extent taste and touch) is considered to be private or taboo and
often goes undiscussed, as we tend to associate the concept of smells with unpleasant
ones like rotten food, body odour or sewers. With vision being the highest sense in the
Renaissance-constructed hierarchy, smell was seen as inferior due to its “animalistic”
characteristics” (Henshaw, 2018, p. 163). This hierarchical view on smell persists today,
whereas “modern Western architecture has largely removed olfactory experiences in the
built environment” (Lipps, 2018b, p. 113). Modern office buildings are environmentally
controlled, with elaborate systems in place to remove smell, humidity, and temperature
fluctuations, leaving little room for olfactory experiences. This contrasts greatly with how
other cultures; particularly Indigenous and Eastern cultures place great importance on
smell to communicate and understand the world around them. For instance, in Japan ofuro
bathtubs are traditionally made out of Hinoki, and this material is chosen for its clean, citrus
smell (which resembles that of cedar wood) and for antiseptic purposes (Lipps, 2018b, p.
113). Asian villages and shopping streets are delightful and intentional smellscapes—the
odour of walking through a market can be a feast for the nose that heightens the overall
visiting or shopping experience in a way that the eyes or ears cannot.

Olfactory experiences are part of design but are often not consciously considered.
Whether we are aware of it or not, smell impacts how we build our urban environments.
The materials we often use in architecture and interior design like glass, steel, and stone
do not smell, making the smell experience in our interior environments limited (Ackerman,
1990, p. 13). However, in landscape architecture this is different. “Before something can
be smelled, it has to be airborne” writes Ackerman (1990, p. 13). Building materials in
the open space react with rainwater and fluctuating temperatures, releasing molecules
into the air, which can then be picked up by our olfactory receptors. Of course, this also
occurs with plant materials. The designer selects many plant species specifically for their
flowers on the basis of their individual smell, form, and colour. Patrick Mooney examines
this in his book Planting Design, Connecting People and Place (2019). Mooney describes
how the strategy of “being away,” from the origin of one’s mental fatigue, and placed into
a fragrant planted space at designed accessible locations, can reinforce reflection and
provide mental restoration (Mooney, 2019, p. 59).

In an urban and rural context, smell can help us remember what the eyes cannot see
(Pallasmaa, 2005, p. 54). Smell enhances our imagination, stimulating learning and
retention (Ackerman, 1990, p. 11). Smell is often related to a dirty, unclean environment, but
in fact smell is part of experiencing a city. You have not seen a city if you have not smelled
it: “every city has its spectrum of tastes and odours” writes Pallasmaa (2005, p. 55). If one
sees a bakery, the smells that come from it might encourage us to imagine sweet flavours
and comfort, or the smells of a fishing town help us imagine a fusing of the sea and land
(Pallasmaa, 2005, p. 54). Smell heightens the experience of places and ingrains memories
of them in our minds. Pallasmaa refers to this as “a space of smell” (2005, p. 48).

While it has been established in scholarly circles that smell is a vital component to how

181
 we design a space, we seldom see this as an important consideration when we actually
design. Incorporating or considering smell is not taught intentionally in design schools. Is
it because design schools are so focused on theory these days that such subjective and
temporal elements are forgotten? This is strange, because smell is around us all the time
and has always been. Can it be included more in design pedagogy? Further, how can
we teach budding designers to analyze, describe, and depict a sense that is invisible and
atmospheric?

Describing smell is difficult. Even in writing, describing smell can be a “real test” (Ackermann,
1990, p. 18). The same could be said for designers. How do you visualize something that
is invisible? If you cannot visualize, appreciate, and design for smell, how can you design
a space or an object that incorporates smell? How can we visualize space to include
olfactory experiences in the design process? It might first be useful to examine how smell is
described in words. For instance, Lipps writes how we tend to describe smell in two ways,
we either “reference its source-cut grass, or a physical property-effervescent” (2018a,
110). If smell is described mostly by its qualities and our personal experiences with them, as
designers we could perhaps take advantage of its spatial qualities and begin to describe
smells visually through a tool such as mapping.

Mapping, writes McLean, “when viewed as a situated, collective process rather than a
representative artefact with inherent meaning, has a creative potential to reveal the unseen,
ephemeral and imagined” (2018, p. 76). Her smellmaps use participatory research, in
which “smellnotes” are collected by participants to generate maps that “visualize the
lived experience of a place” and show “how smell guides us today and in the past to
food, mates and safety” (2018, pp. 111-112). McLean’s research visually maps smell and
highlights how intertwined smells are powerful guides in social urban living. Smell maps can
document human behaviour in designed spaces as well as support urban social design in
the programming of future streetscapes, shops, plazas, event spaces, and food locations.
Victoria Henshaw’s book Urban Smellscapes (2018) is a comprehensive study describing
urban smell and its role in design in detail. She refers to smellwalk experiments which
are a type of sensewalk similar to Hildegard Westerkamp’s soundwalks from the 1970s.
Sensewalks, described by Henshaw provide “useful insights about non-visual aspects of
the environment and the way people use their senses to perceive the environment around
them” (2014, p. 42).

Our olfactory system is important and needs to be nurtured and not excluded in the design
process. Smell is social; it communicates weather, disease, diet, attractiveness, culture, and
connects us to place. Smell is always present, guiding us through our lives. Designers use
memory and our own lived experiences to develop concepts. As we have learned, smell
plays a vital role in constructing our memory and experiences. Should we not then attempt
to understand how smell can be a factor in our designs? The following exercises focus on
olfactory stimuli and how to document the experience in words, visual representation, oral
recording, and smell samples.

182
 4.41
The olfactory
experience of grass,
Samantha Hart, 2018

183
 Exercise 15: Smell Notes
As all authors note, olfactory stimuli can be quite complex to decipher as there can be
multiple scents at once that trigger other senses and memories. In this exercise we will
attempt to catalogue and break down different scents and their meanings.

1. Find a space that is easily accessible to you. This can be anything from a
park, a commercial street, a market, a church, etc.

2. As you move through your chosen space consider the following questions:
Do any of these smells elicit certain emotions or memories?

Are the smells pleasant or unpleasant?

What kinds of colours, words, or textures would you use to describe

the scents?

How do the scents make you interact with the space you are in? Do
you want to linger or do you want to move on?

How intense are the smells?

How long do you experience them?

3. How might you begin to visually convey what you have experienced? This
exercise does not necessarily need to be hand drawn–it can be done in
any way you wish, some examples are with words, an audio recording, a
video, mapping, collages or creation of smell samples.

184
185
 4.42
A comparison of the olfactory
experience of New York City
(above) and Guangzhou (left),
Kemeng Gao, 2018

186
187
 Exercise 16: Smell Mapping
In this exercise you will create a smell map of any space of your choosing. It could be your
urban neighbourhood, an entire city, a village, a park or the natural environment. You will
have to come up with a strategy to collect, record, and visualize the olfactory experiences.
It is important to do a series of different sessions at different times of the day and different
weather conditions as weather heavily impacts smell. Consider also trying this activity for
different seasons.

For inspiration read Victoria Henshaw’s research on smellwalks and Kate McLean’s projects
on smellscape mapping.

During your walk consider the following:

Are there are different smell experiences available?

How can one categorize smell? Diane Ackerman defines basic categories of
smell: “minty (peppermint), floral (roses), ethereal (pears), musky (musk), resinous
(camphor), foul (rotten eggs) and acrid (vinegar)” (1990, p. 11). Are there more
you could invent?

What changes the smell experience? Buildings, roads, trees?

How long do the smells persist? How many smells are there?

Are there smells that re-occur?

Are their multiple smells?

How can a smell’s intensity be described and recorded?

4.43 (left)
International smell
map, Mingjia
Chen, 2018

188
189
 4.44
Smell map of the intersection of Cordova
& Cambie, in Vancouver, Canada, Jacob
Darowski, 2020

190
191
 TASTE
Taste is a multisensorial experience. Taste is complex. Tastes change over a person’s life;
children prefer sweet candy whereas bitter tastes like radicchio or spinach are appreciated
by adults. Babies’ taste buds are the strongest while after the age of 45 the ability to
appreciate taste is reduced. This is generally why older adults add more salt to food
and appreciate stronger flavours as “it takes a stronger taste to create the same level of
sensation” (Ackerman 1990, pp. 139-140). Like learning to draw, we learn to consciously
experience the senses around us, and acquire tastes as we grow (Ackerman 1990, p. 141).
The tongue’s taste buds, or receptors, can differentiate five different tastes: sweet, salty,
sour, bitter, and umami, which the brain catalogues in a “sensory map” that relates to its
experiences of distinct flavours (Lupton, 2018a, p. 66).

Taste is not easy to define but its experience is influential in daily living, and that includes
design. Industrial designers, interior designers, landscape architects, and architects all deal
with taste in their designs—from the inside of buildings, to the streetscape, to farmed and
natural environments, and to gardens. Taste impacts how and what we eat, a function that is
necessary for survival, like breathing. But while breathing happens unconsciously, the act of
eating is a more conscious decision that relies on the individual and the environment around
us, which provides the hunting ground to obtain food. All environments are influenced by
taste, from how food is hunted and gathered, to how it is transported, delivered, packaged,
prepared, and served. And all these stages include design thinking. In Asian and Middle
Eastern countries market spaces are an open and inviting dinner table—the smells, flavours,
cooking sounds, and visual displays are designed to activate a multisensorial experience.

It is important to note that taste needs smell in order to be fully experienced. Neuroscientist
Gordon M. Shepard notes “that smell and taste are so intertwined, we call the combined
sense flavour” (as quoted in Lipps, 2018a, p. 97). When we combine smell with taste, we
get flavour, which is where things start to get interesting. Flavour is not just how the food
tastes on your tongue; it is a combination of smell, texture, and the visual appearance. Taste
is like a musical composition using all of the other senses to heighten the tasting experience.
Chefs are designers of food; they understand how taste works and how components are
layered to create a balanced dish (Kunz and Kaminsky, 2001, p. 4).

192
 4.45
Plastic food, adapted from The
Senses: Design beyond Vision,
drawn by the author, 2020

193
 Much like a balanced dish, design is a series of components that make a whole. Not only
does the sense of smell create flavour, but flavour can also be influenced by the physical
appearance of the food. The ripeness of fruit, a bright to dark red colour in strawberries
signals freshness while a grey tone suggests that we should not eat it. Colour increases the
experience of taste and flavour—the red in jellybeans or cherries communicates a sweet
taste (Lipps, 2018a, p. 103). The shape and texture of the food as we consume it also
influences its flavour perception, otherwise known as “mouthfeel” (Lipps, 2018a, p. 100).
Food engineers study how shapes and visual appearance are associated to a taste–for
instance sweetness generally appears to be round and bitterness appears to be angular.
(Lipps, 2018a, p. 101). Designers should understand that taste creation is a multi-layered
process of many senses acting together. “We eat with our eyes before we even take a
bite, translating cues about colour, texture, temperature, and ripeness that change what we
taste,” summarizes Lipps (2018a, p. 105).

Taste can play a key role in object design. Understanding taste complexity—the visual
appearance, colour, smell, and flavour supports designers’ intentions to create spaces and
objects that can enhance the food experiences. Designers and researchers are developing
tools to outthink and outwit eating desires through objects like packaging and tableware
(Lipps, 2018a, p. 98). These tools use “visual perception” to give the consumer the illusion
that you have more on your table than you actually do in a restaurant context through
the placing of physical fake food on your “platescape,” a term coined by consumer
psychologist Brian Wansink (Lipps, 2018a, p. 98).

Taste also has a perceptional and experiential role to play in the design of buildings and
landscapes. John Ruskin once referred to his travels in Verona saying, “I should like to eat
this Verona touch by touch” (as quoted in Pallasmaa, 2005, p. 59). The visual perception
of the beautiful city of Verona is so strong that Ruskin uses the metaphor touch to express
his amazement of the city’s architectural beauty and his desire to taste those different
experiences literally. Even today we commonly refer to “eating our way through cities.”
Food is central to how our cities operate; the vibrancy of a city or space often depends on
the type and quality of food available. Taste is a vital consideration when designing indoor
and outdoor eating spaces. Integrating the sensorial experience of food into the design
of spaces—including auditory (sound made by chewing and consuming food), visual
perception (colour and placement of food), and touching (feeling of the food while eating,
such as dry, greasy, soft, hard, or chewy) will enrich those spaces. Taste is as important as
the air we breathe, and a designer’s awareness of this sense can be practiced with the
following exercises.

194
 4.46
“I was inspired by the partnership of the salty
and sweet, which work together to frame the
experience. Their rhythm is interrupted by the
other flavours but ultimately they work together
to create a singular whole,” Kathryn Pierre,
2020

195
 Exercise 17: Taste Rave
This exercise attempts to experience taste—an extremely complex task. As you explore
a public market or a grocery store, try to describe (smell, taste, feel, hear, and see) the
different kinds of food that you are tasting. Purchase or try three different items, preferably
something that you have never tried before. Close your eyes and begin to think about the
different tastes and your body’s reaction to them.

Some prompts as you taste test:

How does the food make you feel?

Does the taste remind you of other food, memories, spaces?

Do you like the taste? Do you dislike the taste?

What kinds of colours, words, or textures would you use to describe the taste?

Does the food make a sound when you eat it?

What is its temperature and texture?

How does it smell?

196
197
 4.47
The experience of eating an orange,
Marissa Campbell, 2020

198
199
 4.48
Analysis of a beef
shawarma platter,
Berend Kessler, 2020

200
 4.49
Vessel sketches,
Jacob Darowski,
2020

201
 Exercise 18: Design a Drinking Object
This exercise was inspired by reading the chapter in The Senses-Design beyond Vision on
“Flavour” (pp. 66-71) by Ellen Lupton and “The Sensory Table” (pp. 94-107) by Andrea
Lipps. Lipps describes in her chapter how fake food, applied to fill the plate, reduces
eating habits. The artist Marije Vogelzang pioneered work in eating design, creating food
“prosthetics” that appear like real food, filling the plate so less food is eaten (Lipps, 2018a,
p. 99).

This exercise takes this idea in another direction and asks for a drinking tool to be designed
which gives the perception of drinking a full glass of alcohol or soft drink while actually
drinking much less. Could the same idea be used to create a glass conveying the perception
of being full but in actual fact it is not?

Starting out one should ask questions such as:

How does the liquid move?

What is the colour and texture of the liquid?

What is the form and how can there appear to be more liquid?

How can the liquid be covered up or simulated?

How is the alcohol or sweet smell controlled and reduced?

What material is it made of?

How heavy is it?

What is the colour?

Draw out these ideas; try to model them physically or using 3D software.

202
 Recoommended Reads

On Drawing
Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain, Betty Edwards (1979)
This book is a pedagogically thorough resource to learn how to draw. In its fourth edition,
it is a seasoned book to help the reader learn to draw. It also explains the relationship
between drawing skill and cognitive action using many examples, and it highlights the
importance of drawing in the design process. .

Drawn to Design: Analyzing Architecture through Freehand Drawing, Eric J. Jenkins (2013)
This book is a guide for analytical sketching in architecture. It explains the drawing
process as a means of design exploration providing the techniques necessary to develop
concepts. It clarifies the value of free hand drawing as a fundamental design skill in
education and practice.

Lines: A Brief History, Tim Ingold (2007)

Tim Ingold spent a large amount of his career researching and writing about lines. This
book is a philosophical discourse on lines—examining how the line takes form in the
nature, place, and the printed world.

@Linescapes, Instagram
This Instagram platform run by landscape architects Sonja Rozman Habjanic and
Gaspar Habjanic from Berlin provides short thorough tutorials on freehand landscape
and architectural sketching. The site is updated daily and they provide daily question and
answer sessions.

@Futurelandscapes, Instagram
This Instagram platform is run by designer and landscape architect Stephanie Braconnier
and provides longer tutorial sessions on how to create digital landscape architectural
renderings. The tutorials also engage the learner in the larger landscape context of a
project thereby learning to observe the complexity of the environment.

On Referential Sketching
Architecture: Form, Space and Order, Francis D. K. Ching (2015)
Francis Ching’s many drawing books teach all the foundations of architectural drawing
and are a useful resource to begin to understand how one might go about drawing
space, particularly built space.

Drawing for Landscape Architecture: Sketch to Screen to Site, Edward Hutchinson (2016)
Edward Hutchinson’s book serves as a resource for inspiration about how one might
begin to analyze landscapes. He places a particular emphasis on the importance of
hand drawing, but also shows how this can be then taken to the computer.

Drawing for Landscape Architects, Sabrina Wilk, (2015)

This book is a valuable resource for those looking to better understand how to draw
landscape architectural elements from all scales and views. It is comprehensive in its
graphics and it is recommended to try tracing over the graphics in this book to grasp
landscape architectural graphic conventions.

203
 On Analytical Sketching
Form and Fabric in Landscape Architecture: A Visual Introduction, Catherine Dee (2001)
Catherine Dee is an artist and landscape architect who explains complex landscape
processes and systems at different scales. She uses hand drawing as a tool to develop
diagrams, annotated sketches, and mapping of different landscape processes.

Eames Office, Powers of 10 (1977)

This film available online teaches the importance and understanding of scale from the
universe to a carbon atom. Charles and Ray Eames’ short film is one of the most influential
films ever made on scale and is considered a foundational video for new designers to
watch.

Visual Notes for Architects and Designers, Norman Crowe and Paul Laseau (1984)
This fundamental book on visual literacy provides examples of visual note-taking and
theoretical background knowledge needed to see the world through drawing.

Designers with Sketching Examples

David Adjaye
Alvar Alto
Tadao Ando
Francis D.K. Ching
Le Corbusier
Chris T. Cornelius
Cathrine Dee
Es Devlin
Garret Eckbo
Olafur Eliasson
Norman Foster
Konstantin Gricic
Michael Graves
Zaha Hadid
Lawrence Halprin
Frank Lloyd Wright
Erich Mendelsohn
Frits Palmboom
Renzo Piano
Ronald Rael
Dieter Rams
Richard Rogers
Hans Scharoun
Janet Swailes
Michael Van Valkenburgh

204
 On Photography
The Eye is the Door: Photography and the Art of Visual Thinking, Anne Whiston Spirn
(2014)
This book describes photography as not only a seeing and recording tool but also a
visual thinking tool to expose design problems at all scales visually to provide solutions.
We highly recommend the book for designers looking to use photography as an essential
part of their analysis and observation process.

On Photography, Susan Sontag (1973)

This fundamental book on photography is a compilation of essays expressing the history of
photography and provides Susan Sontag’s personal view on photography in the politically
changing times of the 1970s.

A Short Story of Photography, Walter Benjamin (1931)

This essay explores the consequences photography would have globally at a period of
time where there was drastic technological and political change. It provides insight on how
photography’s influence increased through the improved reproduction technology in the
first half of the 20th century, and how this increased reproduction made photos a common
commodity instead of an individual’s artistic expression.

Ways of Seeing, John Berger (1972)

This fundamental book describes how we see and understand pictures through an art
historical lens. It provides different methods for how to view pictures and suggests methods
of how to see, learn, and interpret art in multiple ways.

On Hearing
Soundscape and the Built Environment, Jiang Kang and Brigitte Schulte-Fortkamp ed. (2016)
This book systematically discusses current soundscapes in the built environment. It provides
theory and basic background, and explains what a soundscape is, how is it important, and
how does it affect people in terms of their health and perception of the acoustic environment.
The book also explains tools for implementing a soundscape approach, with measurement
techniques, mapping, and good soundscape practices, and describes examples of the
application of the soundscape approach in planning, design, and assessment.

Wednesday is Indigo Blue: Discovering the Brain of Synesthesia, Richard Cytowic and
David Eagleman (2011)
This book explains the current research that exists on synesthesia—how our brains do this
and what it looks like. It’s an interesting read to see how and why our brains make certain
associations.

Kids Describe Color to a Blind Person, The Cut, (2017)

Available on YouTube, children are asked to try and describe colours to someone who
cannot see colours. The responses are quite funny and prompt thinking about how to
describe something that is so visual.

“Soundwalking” Autumn Leaves, Sound and the Environment in Artistic Practice, Hildegard
Westerkamp (2007)
This article is easily available online and we highly recommend that you read it to learn

205
 more about soundscapes. It details and guides you along solitary and group soundwalks
and introduces different sound descriptions to learn the difference between “hearing and
listening” (Westerkamp, 2007, pp. 49-58). Her instructions begin with having students first
choose an outdoor space. She then prescribes a series of activities to heighten your listening
skills. Students are recommended to walk around the space and begin to note different
aspects of the space—for instance if the walk is more pleasing acoustically or visually. She
describes how to have a dialogue with different sounds you may come across; for instance,
copying a bird singing and observing—”listening” to—its reaction and response.

On Smelling
“Scentscape” in The Senses: Design beyond Vision, Andrea Lipps (2018)
Lipps provides an updated version on olfactory research and design and includes
innovative research into olfactory visualization/mapping, building materials in architecture,
interior design, and cosmetics.

Urban Smellscapes, Victoria Henshaw (2014)

This book comprehensively examines smell theory and design practice of scholars,
artists, and professionals who are interested in smell and how to design smell-inclusive
places/spaces in cities. It is the first of its kind in examining the role of smell specifically in
contemporary experiences and perceptions of English towns and cities, highlighting the
perception of urban smellscapes as inter-related with place perception, and describing
smell’s contribution towards overall sense of place. With case studies from factories,
breweries, urban parks, and experimental smell environments, the book identifies processes
by which urban smell environments are managed and controlled, and gives designers and
city managers tools to actively use smell in their work. The book provides a deep scholastic
and urban design focused book in which she summarizes current knowledge and her own
research on smells and how to design with smell in the urban environment. The whole book
is a comprehensive contemporary insight into smell in urban design.

Designing with Smell, Victoria Henshaw (2018)

This book aims to inspire designers to actively consider smell in their work. It provides
practical guidance regarding different equipment, techniques, stages, and challenges
which might be encountered as part of this process. Throughout the text there is an emphasis
on spatial design in numerous forms and interpretations in the urban environment, as well as
the representation of spatial relationships with smell.

On Tasting
The Elements of Taste, Gray Kunz and Peter Kaminsky (2001)
This book describes how chefs define taste and its complex, intertwined relationships with
the other senses. The introduction is of particular interest as it attempts to categorize and
describe a myriad of tastes in a way that is poetic and visual.

“Flavour” in The Senses: Design beyond Vision, Ellen Lupton (2018)

This chapter describes how smell and taste are intertwined physically with each other in the
human body. The taste buds and olfactory/smell receptors work hand in hand to create
flavour. The chapter also describes how flavour impacts visual and tactile perception and
how the brain fuses them.

206
 References
Ackerman, D. (1990). A Natural History of the Senses. New York, NY: Random House.

Adams, M., Bruce, N., Davies, W. J., Cain, R., Jennings, P., Carlyle, A., Cusack, P., Hume,
K., & Plack, C. (2007). Soundwalking as a methodology for understanding soundscapes.
Proceedings of the Institute of Acoustics, 30(2), 1-7.

Ambroziak B. M. (2005). Michael Graves: Images of a Grand Tour. Princeton: Princeton

Architectural Press.

Benjamin, W. (1931/1972). A Short History on Photography. Screen, 13(1), 5-26.

https://doi.org/10.1093/screen/13.1.5

Bourbonne, A. (2018). Tactile Sound. In E. Lupton & A. Lipps (Eds.), The Senses: Design
beyond Vision, (pp. 148-155). New York, NY: Princeton Architecture Press.

Cerwéna, G., Kreutzfeldt, J., & Wingren, C. (2017). “Soundscape actions: A tool for
noise treatment based on three workshops in landscape architecture.” Frontiers of
Architectural Research, 6(4), 505-518. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foar.2017.10.002

Copeland, L. (2017, Jan. 5). Feel the Music—Literally—With Some Help from New
Synesthesia Research. Smithsonian. Retrieved from https://bit.ly/2lY0F6o

Crowe, N. & Laseau, P. (2012). Visual Notes for Architects and Designers. Hoboken, NJ:
John Wiley & Sons.

Dee, C. (2001). Form and Fabric in Landscape Architecture: A Visual Introduction. New
York, NY: Routledge.

Eiliat, H., & Pusca, D. (2013). Teaching and learning experience using digital sketching.
2013 3rd Interdisciplinary Engineering Design Education Conference, pp. 134-138. doi:
10.1109/IEDEC.2013.6526774

Have, R., & van der Toorn, M. (2012). The role of hand drawing in basic design
education in the digital age. International Conference on Engineering and Mathematics,
Bangalore, 2012, pp. 72-80. Les Ulis: EDP Sciences.

Henshaw, V. (2014). Urban Smellscapes: Understanding and Designing City Smell

Environments. New York, NY: Routledge.

Hutchinson Guest, A. (1990). Dance Notation. Perspecta, 26, 203-214.

Jenkins, E. J. (2013). Drawn to Design. Basel, CH: Birkhauser.

Kunz, G. & Kaminsky, P. (2001). Introduction. In The Elements of Taste, (2-21). New York,
NY: Little, Brown and Company,

Landau, S. (2018). Drawing by Touching. In E. Lupton & A. Lipps (Eds.), The Senses:
Design beyond Vision, (pp. 176-177). New York, NY: Princeton Architecture Press.

Leatherbarrow, D. (1998). Showing what otherwise hides itself. Harvard Design

Magazine, 50-55.

Lipps, A. (2018a). Scentscape. In E. Lupton & A. Lipps (Eds.), The Senses: Design beyond
Vision, (108 -121). New York, NY: Princeton Architecture Press

207
 Lipps, A. (2018b). The Sensory Table. In E. Lupton & A. Lipps (Eds.), The Senses: Design
beyond Vision, (pp. 94-107). New York, NY: Princeton Architecture Press.

Lupton, E. (2018a). Notes on Touch, Sound, Smell, and Flavor. In E. Lupton & A. Lipps
(Eds.), The Senses: Design beyond Vision, (pp. 36-66). New York, NY: Princeton
Architecture Press.

Lupton, E. (2018b). Tactile Graphics. In E. Lupton & A. Lipps (Eds.), The Senses: Design
beyond Vision, (pp. 158-175). New York, NY: Princeton Architecture Press.

Lupton, E. (2018c). Visualizing Sound. In E. Lupton & A. Lipps (Eds.), The Senses: Design
beyond Vision, (pp. 204-217). New York, NY: Princeton Architecture Press.

Mau, B. (2018). Designing LIVE: A new medium for the senses. In E. Lupton & A. Lipps
(Eds.), The Senses: Design beyond Vision, (pp. 20-23). New York, NY: Princeton
Architecture Press.

McLean, K. (2018). Communicating and mediating smeelscapes: The design and

exposition of olfactory mappings. In V. Henshaw, K. McLean, D. Medway, C. Perkins &
G. Warnaby (Eds.), Designing with Smell: Practices, Techniques and Challenges, (pp.
67-77). New York, NY: Routledge.

Mooney, P. (2019). Planting Design, Connecting People and Place. New York, NY:
Routledge.

Pallasmaa, J. (2005). The Eyes of the Skin. West Sussex, UK: Wiley Publishing.

Sacks, O. (2007). Musicophilia. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.

Sontag, S. (1973). On Photography. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Tufte, E. W. (1990). Envisioning Information. Cheshire, CT: Graphics Press.

Unwin, S. (2007). Analyzing architecture through drawing. Building Research &

Information, 35(1), 101–110. doi: 10.1080/09613210600879881

Westerkamp, H. (2007). Soundwalking. In A. Carlyle (Ed.), Autumn Leaves, Sound and

the Environment in Artistic Practice, (pp. 49-58). Paris: Double Entendre

Whiston Spirn, A. (2014). The Eye Is a Door: Landscape, Photography, and the Art of
Discovery. Boston, MA: Wolf Tree Press.

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Chapter 5
Teaching Multisensorial Literacy
 5.1
Potsdamer Platz Hotel
Green Roof, drawn by
the author, 1996

211
 Teaching Multi-Sensory Design
While historically sight has been the emphasized sense in design teaching, there needs to
be a shift in pedagogy to include all the senses. However, re-learning to see not simply
with our eyes but with our entire bodies is not just a task for students. Instructors also need to
integrate the five senses more actively in their design studios, lecture courses, and seminars.
This chapter provides suggestions for instructors to teach beyond visual literacy and
consider instead teaching multisensorial literacy. These suggestions are based mostly on
the author’s own professional and academic experience training landscape architecture
and architecture students for more than 20 years in Europe and North America.

As multisensorial literacy is part of foundational design education, it should be taught

from the beginning to the end of spatial design degrees with a strong emphasis during
the first year. The first year of design school is one of the most influential and impactful in
design education and it is here that foundational design skills are developed. It is therefore
recommended that the most experienced and seasoned design teachers are engaged for
this task—more experienced professors should be teaching first-year students. Extensive
design teaching knowledge and pedagogical experience are needed to convey the
complex design process visually, orally, and as the author additionally recommends,
multisensorially. In North American design schools, for example, less experienced instructors
typically teach first-year students because the more senior instructors would like, or are
encouraged by their universities, to focus more on research. They also often see teaching
the first-year as being more labour intensive and time consuming during the semester. While
it can be at times demanding to teach earlier years, it can also be very rewarding helping
students strive to become designers. It is paramount that design education begins with
solid foundational design knowledge and a skill set of design thinking from site immersion
to ideation. Teaching students again in the upper years will be more rewarding if they are
able to develop a rigorous foundation in their first year. This will in turn reduce the teaching
load in the upper years to enable professors to focus more on research and creativity.

Multisensorial literacy however is not only important in the design profession. Medical
students learn anatomy by drawing, as do botany students in order to understand
the details of a plant, and engineers for the complexity of machines.). Multisensorial
diagnostics were once important in the medical profession, however the advancement
in radiology has initiated a decrease in doctors’ abilities to smell a disease, or touch and
listen to the sound of symptoms (Whiston Spirn, 2014, p. 115). Training students to rely
on their senses as important recording devices is on the decline. Whiston Spirn argues
that we should continue to teach multisensorial literacy, even outside of the design world.
For instance, medical students looking at art can study skin colour, posture, and learn to
distinguish between different patterns of form to develop an understanding of patients and
their condition (Whiston Spirn, 2014, p. 116).

Drawing is a readily available learning tool that can bring awareness to the sense of sight
and with it an interest in including the other senses in the multisensorial design process.
Practicing drawing increases the skill of visual thinking (Whiston Spirn, 2014, p 115).
Training students to communicate through hand-drawing is on the decline. Studying art,
especially the works of the masters, can help everyone learn to see. Drawing, observing,
and learning about art stimulates the mind to better understand colour, texture, composition,
and complexity.

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 5.2
Class summary,
Jonathan Behnke, 2020

213
 David Drazil, notes that there has been a resurgence of analog drawing skills in design.
As students are encouraged to learn how to utilize digital software above all else, the
emphasis on hand drawing is often sidelined. He notes that there is more demand for
analog drawing skills now, in particular for design communication and idea development
as digital software often cannot fulfill this need (Flores, 2019). The creative design process
is often missing in digital drawing, whereas “sketching is the instant connection of head and
mind” (Flores, 2019).

Multisensorial literacy is the key to critical and creative thinking. It helps students to deeply
understand for example, the difference between accessible and inclusive design. While a
ramp provides access for wheelchairs in a museum, it does not provide inclusive access
for all visitors. For instance, if the visitor is visually impaired, they will interact with the
museum and its exhibits very differently from someone who has 20/20 vision. Instructors,
therefore, need to be mindful of how they teach the design process for inclusivity. It starts
by addressing inclusive design at all design process stages, as laid out in Chapter 2 of
this book, beginning with the site immersion stage, and ending with design ideas. In the
design process, instructors should reiterate including all design users in their design process.
Acquiring multisensorial literacy permits students to consider more deeply how the senses
are used in the environment and how they provide a knowledge base that informs design
learning.

Skill Training
Skill can be regarded as trained practice (Swailes, 2016, p. 46). Learning a new skill
is much like learning a new language and can only truly be successful through practice
and repetition. The same could be said about learning to sketch or draw. Landscape
architect Janet Swailes writes “practice remains interesting through its structure using the
hand and eye, with people learning and improving through repetition…repetition through
tracing provides practice in terms of both drawing skills and a deeper engagement and
familiarity with the subject” (2016, p. 46). If the pedagogical processes of how we teach
sketching and drawing through practice are considered, one could use this method to
teach multisensorial perception. The author suggests that the method of learning by
repetition could be extended to practice interpreting all senses. The corporal recording
mechanisms of the ear and skin, hands and feet, and mouth and nose should be trained
in design education to be consciously activated to practice multisensorial literacy. The
author suggests that repeating multisensorial perception exercises in design education, is
as important as a skill for students as drawing and field sketching.

There is a call in design schools to place more emphasis on learning as a process—that

mistakes, and at times failures, are inevitable and okay. There is beauty in practice and
improvement, and as educators, we owe it to our students to teach them the importance
of recognizing and valuing the process as much as or even more than the final outcome.
Practice is a vital part of the skill-building process, and this needs to be encouraged.
Another aspect is teaching students to “let go.” As Swailes notes on her experiences with
teaching students field sketching, learning to let go is recognized in the practice of skills
competency, and “repetition…corrects imperfections” (2016, p. 46).

Further, the pressure to teach digital tools has extensively reduced our tendency to
encourage communication through hand sketching. This is a dilemma, as sketching is a
visual thinking process and allows for a quick visual record by the students to be effectively

214
 5.3
“Interpreting and representing the unique, multisensorial experiences
we each have is a crucial and under-valued communication skill.
Our perception of objects, spaces, and senses varies, and designers
must consider the range in sensation that they are introducing to their
audiences,” Mariah Campbell, 2020

215
 reviewed and critiqued by an instructor. It is suggested that design instructors today should
still practice and encourage hand drawing as a part of the design process—and to hand
draw themselves as they instruct on an individual basis or in front of the entire class. We
also recommend that at a minimum, students keep sketchbooks, and professors place an
academic importance on hand sketching and annotation. This could primarily be achieved
through regular checks on students’ work along with positive regular reinforcement and
critique of the design process. There could also be an emphasis on grading the effort in
process and thinking rather than the final outcome.

Syllabus Design
For teaching the senses, a structured syllabus with clear goals is important. Reading should
be encouraged but not forced. To make sure that reading for each session is carried out
by the students, the selection of the topics and length of the readings should focus on
the observation of each sense alone first before they are synthesized in the analysis and
design process. This will keep students focused on one topic and allow them to become
familiar with the individual senses. Roughly 15-30 pages a week is suggested for first-year
undergraduate students. There should be a balance between scholarly rigour of theoretical
understanding and the transfer of that knowledge through practicing observation of the
senses and recording them in the environment.

It is suggested that the readings are discussed at the beginning of each seminar, lecture
course, and in studios. The assignments on visual and multisensorial literacy could, for
example, be integrated with 3- to 5-hour exercises in the studio, lecture course or seminar,
or a whole course or seminar could be taught on the senses. The author currently teaches
such a course at the University of British Columbia.

It is also important to make sure the syllabus is not too prescriptive in wording and
deliverables. The syllabus should encourage thinking by doing. For example: encourage
observation through site immersion, field recording, analysis, and design synthesis with the
sensorial observation exercises described in Chapter 4. An open-ended assignment with a
series of prompts will challenge the students to record and describe beyond the visual and
choose their own recording method they feel comfortable with, for example, with sound
or video recording and a transcription into text and drawings. Some exercises should
have opportunities for comparing sensorial perception among students, to encourage the
discussion of the individual sensorial observations. For example, students tasting or smelling
the same food and can compare their experience, by describing the taste or smell visually,
orally, as text, sound recording, or with video or podcasts, or as a combination of different
recordings. It is important for the instructor to balance artistic non-prescribed exercises
with prescribed comparison exercises. The idea of artistic non-prescribed exercises is to
broaden the student’s creative thinking strategies for how to observe and record the senses,
instead of teaching them a more prescribed set of smells or tastes.

The assignment deliverables should be open ended at first, as any deliverable restrictions
tend to hinder creativity in presentation. If documentation is required, the students should
learn to figure it out for themselves. Often documentation is very prescriptive to satisfy the
instructor’s need to document their own teaching work for tenure and promotion, instead of
thinking of the student’s presentation skill learning needs. This defeats the important purpose

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 of experimentation in pedagogy—for students to learn and discover oral presentation and
layout techniques by doing it completely themselves.

Online Teaching
With the COVID19 epidemic, teaching has changed dramatically and perhaps forever.
Teaching multisensorial literacy online is not at a disadvantage compared to traditional
onsite teaching; it is just a different format of teaching. It opens up global opportunities for
seeing the environment and encourages students to engage with their direct communities
and environments. The class time is spent focusing on on-screen learning to observe and
record while the instructor uses a tablet to visualize their teaching content. It is paramount
that the instructor writes a script or storyboard beforehand, with the main components
of the lecture visualized in images and annotated. This will visually frame and focus the
lecture content but leaves it open for additional content to be added during online class
time. As everything is recorded, one must see this lecture time as an interactive teaching
performance. It is paramount for students to have an asynchronous lecture and teaching
experience. Short breaks should be provided after 30-40 minute sessions. There should
be space for students to communicate with each other and connect inside and outside of
the classroom. Create short online exercises during class which can be carried out by the
students in their direct environment to initiate the seeing, recording, and analyzing process
through drawing. The exercises should be short (15-30 minutes), and easily adaptable to
their environments. For example, an exercise could entail recording the flow of rain on their
building. The whole session should be recorded for students to access later to review and
reiterate what they have learned. Further, the students’ work can be screen shared in class,
discussed, and reviewed by the peers and instructor. A recorded lecture also allows the
instructor to review their performance, giving them more precise advice on how to improve.

This method practices observation and drawing with immediate feedback. During the week,
the students can review the recording and then complete their own assignments locally.
The completed assignments can then be uploaded on an online platform for the instructor
and peers to review. Online teaching widens the environmental field of vision to observe
from local to global sites, creating an internationally inclusive design education. It allows
students to learn about each other’s personal culture and environments as the assignments
can be carried out anywhere. Research has shown that screen time is more valuable and
effective as a learning tool, as long it is interactive, with small assignments carried out
online, conversation initiated and with it thinking stimulated. A pre-recorded video or movie
without active participation will take away that cognitive creative process of recording
the observations. Watching a pre-recorded movie or video is passive; the director and
actors have created the images, and it only stimulates sight and sound. The other senses
taste, touch, and smell are excluded. Online live recorded teaching, however, is adaptive
and interactive, and therefore is a teaching tool. Observing the environment is a cognitive
process where “mental imagery” is practiced through the multi-sensory experience on site
(Suggate & Martzog, 2020, p. 3).

Fear of Failure
It takes many years of practice until drawing becomes an unconscious skill to be used as
a thinking tool, like being a skilled driver or professional musician, just as it takes many
years of practice until a piano player can improvise a melody. Sketching is not taught often
enough in design education, and when it is taught, it is mostly in brief, introductory courses.

217
 There is not enough emphasis on sketching throughout the entire design education process,
as the focus tends to be on mastering digital drawing tools.

There are multiple ways in which fear of failure can be experienced by students. For
instance, researchers have found that the primary emotion that derives from fear of failure is
shame. Students may avoid uncertain or unfavourable tasks or events to avoid the feeling of
shame. Students can develop a learned helplessness so that they are conditioned to accept
failure (Choi, 2020, pp. 3-4). Here, we may see instances where a student will describe
themselves as a “bad drawer” to avoid the shame of failing. We know that failure and
mistakes are necessary for improvement. In my experiences, one of the biggest challenges
in teaching students to sketch is addressing their fear that the images they have drawn do
not adequately explain the content they are recording, as well as their concern with how the
sketch is drawn in terms of its accuracy and line expression. This causes students to freeze
and either not draw at all or compare their skillset with other students. The inexperienced
sketcher is often left thinking too much about how to draw rather than using sketching as a
tool to think (Jenkins, 2013, p. 30).

How might we create this kind of open environment? Instructors should consider how they
might want to teach students how to think through sketching. It is here where the instructor
has an opportunity to support students in overcoming their fear. If assignments are focused
too much on drawing accurately and precisely, rather than providing a space to play and
experiment, then the students might find it difficult to express themselves. It is the instructor’s
responsibility to choose exercises that incite engaged thinking and playful recording,
creating a space where sketching can become an important tool when thinking about
space. We have had good outcomes with teaching through animated visualizations done
by the instructor prior to class. The exercises should encourage students to record in their
own style, rather than attempting to record precisely what they see in front of them. Seeing
is also hearing, smelling, tasting, and touching. Encouraging them to engage with their
environments multisensorially, for instance by asking them to draw blind fold, will distract
them from just being focused on drawing referentially. In a class setting, students who are not
experienced drawers often freeze when they see other students drawing more confidently.
This fear accelerates when students are put on the spot in front of more experienced
sketchers. Thus, any form of review that examines their work more in depth should focus on
content rather than accuracy.

5.4
Class Summary,
Doug Craig, 2020

218
 5.5
Drawing class at the
Museum of Anthropology, in
Vancouver, Canada, 2015

219
 How do professionals teach students to be free of this fear? Architect David Drazil suggests
that we need to encourage failure as an essential component to becoming a strong designer;
“to fail as often and as early as possible…the more you fail during the process, the better
the result at the end” (Flores, 2019). A good way to avoid fear of failure in students, is by
beginning the course with basic drawing skills but also ensuring that the assignments given
introduce playful elements to these skill-building exercises, for instance, practicing drawing
straight lines, but also exploring how simple lines can convey emotions or actions. Giving
the students joy with achievable, motivating exercises is important. Drawing is, after all, a
physical and cognitive skill (Jenkins, 2013, p. 31). It is important to provide readings and
theory drawing from skilled sketchers and scholars to provide an intellectual background
around why and how to practice drawing. Working with narratives and metaphors, such as
the explanation of practicing piano to become a confident musician or training to become
a professional athlete, can reinforce in a student’s mind that drawing is a skill that can be
practiced and thereby learned.

Playfulness and experimentation are key in teaching this content. While we want students
to learn important technical skills, we also want to encourage creativity. A study done
with students in the Faculty of Architecture at Kraków University of Technology (Kraków,
Poland) found that when creative drawing and painting was incorporated into the students’
study program, there was a positive effect on the rest of their curriculum. The study found
that the students developed a greater imagination and creative awareness and that the
art of drawing and painting supplemented the technical foundations of the curriculum
(Domarzewski, 2019).

Instagram and YouTube have become online platforms for the sketching community, new
and old, to learn about sketching and overcoming the fear of putting pen to paper. Tired
of the rigidity that can arise with digital drawing tools, many young designers have begun
examining their relationships with freehand sketching. Two platforms are especially of
interest: “Sketch like an Architect” by David Drazil, and “Linescapes” by Rozman Habjanic
and Gasper Habjanic. Habjanic and Habjanic had a professor in school who not only
taught them to sketch, but also instilled in them a passion and knowledge to teach others.
All three designers see Instagram as a valuable medium for teaching hand drawing skills,
providing daily drawing tutorials and methods to encourage the ideation process.

Site Visits
In first year in particular, and regularly throughout the first professional design degrees,
project sites for studio courses should be chosen locally and be easily accessible to allow
for students to immerse themselves in the site.

To teach visual and multisensorial literacy, regular site visits with the instructor are important,
rather than only visiting the site at the beginning of a project. It is suggested that instructors
visit a site at least three times at the stages of (1) observation (site immersion) and recording
process, (2) analysis process, and (3) ideation process. This will allow for the students
to engage repeatedly with the environmental context in which they are designing. It will
support their understanding of how to perceive, read, and analyze a design problem in its
surrounding context with all senses. Observation, recording, analysis, and synthesis of ideas
are all part of design, and teaching should encourage going back and forth between the
three.

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 Multi-Sensorial Teaching Check List

Preparation Stage Suggested Directions

1. Instructor selection Balance seasoned and unseasoned instructors in first year

2. Prepare course content For seminars and courses prepare 2-3 papers to read per
about the senses week

For studio 2 papers to read per week

Consider other types of multimedia that may be more

relevant than readings

3. Prepare syllabus For seminars and courses weekly assignments

For studio projects integrate assignments throughout the

overarching design assignment

4. Prepare assignments In seminars and courses balance prescribed and

nonprescribed tasks and encourage comparative
observations and studies

For studio integrate the senses throughout the design

assignment

5. Prepare regular site visits For seminars and courses visit weekly

For studio a minimum of three times at the observation,

analysis and synthesis stage, emphasize that all three
stages are “design” and that it is a constant back and forth
between all three

221
 Preparation Stage Suggested Directions
6. Plan regular discussions of For seminar and course 1 hour per week
readings and observations
in class For studio integrate discussion throughout the design
assignment

7. Initiate assignment upload For seminar and courses check in on student performance
on blog designed by by instructor weekly
students
For studio a minimum of three times at the observation,
analysis and synthesis stage

8.Initiate student lead final Students show a selection of assignments via projector
presentation with video, sound or podcast recordings, or printed,
handmade images, collages or models

9. Provide feedback For seminar and courses during final presentation by

reviewers and instructor

For studio during presentations and individual student

meetings

222
223
 5.6
Class Summary,
Jacob Darowski, 2020
224
 References
Choi, B. (2020). I’m afraid of not succeeding in learning: Introducing an instrument to
measure higher education students’ fear of failure in learning. Studies in Higher Education,
1-13. doi: 10.1080/03075079.2020.1712691

Domarzewski, A. (2019). Architecture students gain experience from open-air workshops

in drawing and painting. World Transactions on Engineering and Technology Education,
17(3), 373-378.

Flores, M [host]. (2019, July 23). How can sketching make us better designers? A
conversation with David Drazil [audioa podcast episode]. In The Archiologist. Retrieved
from https://www.sketchlikeanarchitect.com/blog/podcast-advice-to-fresh-graduates­
how-to-overcome-fear-of-failure-my-backstory-and-more

Jenkins, E. J. (2013). Drawn to Design. Basel: Birkhauser.

Whiston Spirn, A. (2014). The Eye Is a Door: Landscape, Photography, and the Art of
Discovery. Boston: Wolf Tree Press.

Suggate, S.P. & Martzog, P. (2020). Screen-time influences children’s mental imagery
performance. Developmental Science, 23(6), 1-13. https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.12978

Swailes, J. (2016). Field Sketching and the Experience of Landscape. Abingdon:

Routledge.

226
Chapter 6
For an Inclusive Future
 6.1
Thinking through
drawing, Potsdamer
Platz courtyard design,
drawn by the author,
1996

229
 Conclusion
Teaching visual literacy has a long documented theoretical and practiced tradition in
design schools. With books by Berger on seeing, Crowe and Laseau on visual notes,
Ching on architectural drawing, Jenkins with Drawn to Design, Hanks and Bellison with
“rapid viz”, McKim on experiences in visual thinking, Swailes on field sketching, Sullivan on
drawing the landscape, Dee in Form and Fabric in Landscape Architecture, Hutchison on
drawing for landscape architecture, Whiston Spirn in The Eye is the Door, Pallasmaa in The
Eyes of the Skin and The Thinking Hand, Sontag’s On Photography, Laseau on freehand
sketching, and Treib on Drawing/Thinking to name a few, the wealth of knowledge on
suggested theories and practices about visual literacy over the last 40 years by so many
scholars has helped students and professionals “to see’ the environment “visually” around
us. Reading these books and articles has been positively overwhelming while writing this
book. Without these scholarss wealth of knowledge and the author’s own lifelong drawing
and teaching experience, this book would not have been possible.

230
 6.2
Drawing of a memory,
by the author, 2008

231
 We are now entering the third decade of the twenty-first century, where design teachers
are required to teach visual literacy more and more with digital tools instead of analog
tools like hand sketching. We also now have the additional digital recording tools of tablets
or smart phones for hand drawing, for recording sound and movement, and for video
to animate observations and new ideas. We also understand the necessity of designing
more inclusively for everyone: the wheelchair or mobility device user, the blind or visually
impaired, and the deaf or hard of hearing. This, however, also means teaching more
inclusive design thinking from the outset of a design problem, in the design studio, and
using what this book has sought to coin as “multisensorial literacy”. In the above books
written by designers and design scholars, the author noticed that only a few specifically
suggest including all the senses in the design process. They are first and foremost Juhani
Pallasmaa, a pioneer in the field of architecture and the senses, Catherine Dee, and Janet
Swailes. There is also the pioneering book on all the main senses by Diane Ackerman’s A
Natural History of the Senses, and more recently Victoria Henshaw’s Urban Smellscapes,
Understanding and Designing City Smell Environments, a fundamental book on smell in
environmental design. Ellen Lupton and Andrea Lipps’ book The Senses: Design beyond
Vision, addresses especially the other four main senses apart from sight in design education
and practice. Their book has chapters written by scholars and designers with a wealth
of inspiring artistic, technical, and useful tools to heighten the attention and necessity of
designing multisensorially. Finally, in 2015, Soundscape and the Built Environment by
Jian Kang and Brigitte Schulte-Fortkamp, which is a compilation of current soundscape
research in relation to the built environment by scholars and designers. All these books
are fundamental resources to understand the senses with examples of how to experience
them and use that experience to create designs. But what was missing until now are
pedagogical design exercises to gradually practice using the senses individually, first to
observe and record them in the environment, and then to synthesize them for the analysis
and design process.

This book provides a guide for “seeing” the world with all five senses. It also provides a
theoretical and practical framework and exercises to learn how to observe (see), record,
explore, analyze, and include (synthesize) all the main five senses in design. The book
acknowledges digital and analog methods and provides students examples from a
seminar given in fall 2018 and 2020 called “Seeing Environment at the University of British
Columbia. It is suggested that visual literacy and “multisensorial literacy” be practiced
throughout the whole first professional design degree in any design field, be it architecture,
landscape architecture, urban design, or industrial design. Intentionally, the book is not
focusing only on architecture, landscape architecture, urban design, or industrial design, as
the author feels that as a designer, one needs to train “seeing” at all environmental scales,
because design problems are interconnected.

Further research will be needed in the future to clarify what kinds of exercises are useful
to practice multisensorial literacy and their effectiveness. This book does not separate
the seeing process of the different design professions to avoid unconsciously creating a
hierarchy of the senses and falling into the same trap as in the Renaissance, where sight was
preeminent. All senses are important in the design process.

232
 Glossary
analytical sketching
A recording of what cannot be immediately seen.

design analysis
The systematic decision-making process of developing a design; including all information of
the design problem in its environmental context, planning, and communications.

environmental experience
Gathering knowledge through the physical experience and observation of the environment.

framework
A visual structure that helps organize the information and ideas of a design problem more
effectively.

ideation process
Ideation is idea generation. Big visions are generated through drawings and models, casting
a wide net in terms of concept and outcome.

mapping
There are two kinds of mapping: cartographic maps and mind maps for visualizing and
analyzing processes, sequences and change through different layers of information. The
layering tool is used for analysis and presentation purposes.

metaphor
Metaphor derives from the Greek word metaphora, to “carry over.” One kind of object or
idea is used in place of another, to suggest a similarity between them or an object, activity,
or idea treated as a metaphor.

multisensorial literacy
The ability to understand, analyze, interpret, and make meaning of a space by engaging and
using the five senses.

observation of the environment

Environmental observations are key pieces of information that, put together, help build
understanding of the environmental context in which the design problem is placed.

olfaction
Olfaction is the sense of smell. Special sensory receptor (cells) called sensory neurons in
the nasal cavity connect directly to the brain. Each sensory neuron has one odour receptor.
Microscopic molecules released by substances around us—a rose or a forest—stimulate these
receptors. Once the neurons detect the molecules, they send messages to the brain, which
identifies the smell. There are more smells in the environment than there are receptors, and any
given molecule may stimulate a combination of receptors, creating a unique representation
in the brain. These representations are registered by the brain as a particular smell.

olfactory
The olfactory system, or sense of smell, is the sensory system used for smelling.

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 orthographic drawing
A drawing that represents a three-dimensional object using several two-dimensional views of
the object, this includes plan, section, and elevation.

perception
Perception refers to the way sensory information is organized, interpreted, and consciously
experienced in the environment.

perspective
A three-dimensional representation of the world in a two-dimensional drawing or digital
image.

photography
The term photography is derived from Greek words photos, which means light, and graphe,
which means to write—resulting in the direct translation “writing of light”. The term graphe can
also be interpreted as a tool or instrument of recording.

recording
The documentation of the environmental experience through analog (hand drawing), digital
(video, sound, photography) images, and body recordings such as memories, emotions, and
experiences.

referential sketching
Referential or representational sketching records what can be seen and experienced
immediately in front of our eyes.

representation
Representation in this book refers to static visual images drawn by hand or computer and
animated images on the computer.

seeing
Seeing does not mean seeing the environment with the eyes alone. It is an overarching term
to describe the use of the five senses including: touch, taste, sound and smell.

sensation in the environment

A mental process (such as seeing, hearing, tasting, or smelling) resulting from the immediate
external stimulation of a sense organ often as distinguished from a conscious awareness of
the sensory process.

senses
The physical abilities of sight, smell, hearing, touch, and taste.

sensorial in design
Sensorial is a less common word for sensory. Sensory information isn’t limited to the traditional
five senses: sight, smell, taste, touch, and sound. There are many more, however this book
focuses only on the five main senses.

234
 sight
Visual sense or the faculty or power of seeing.

site immersion
Site immersion is physical engagement with a site, best by walking, to allow for a
multisensorial observation with sound, smell, touch, taste, and sight, and recording of its
existing conditions.

synthesis in design
The process of combining design ideas into a design proposal. It is an activity that is done
at the end of the creative inquiry. This process leads to creation of a coherent new design.

visual acuity
Studying the environment precisely with your eyes.

vision in design
The personal position in the design synthesis process resulting in a design proposal.

visual literacy
The ability to interpret, negotiate, and make meaning from information presented in the form
of an image, extending the meaning of literacy, which commonly signifies interpretation of
a written or printed text.

visual thinking
An analytical observation and design process through “looking,” which can be learned
through practice of observing and recording through sketching, photography or video
seeking, and studying patterns in the environment.

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 Index
accessibility 22, 214 Ching, Francis D.K. 203, 204, 228
Ackerman, Diane 180, 181, 182, 188, 192, Cleveland (US) 97–98
232 collage/photomontage 9, 14, 38, 45, 184
album art exercise 177, 178 context, environmental 12, 14, 22, 36
Alto, Alvar 144, 204 Copeland, L. 167
analytical sketching 104, 105, 106, COVID19 pandemic 8, 217
121–130, 233; above/below Craig, Doug 174, 218
ground exercise 127–130, 127, Crowe, Norman 9, 104, 108, 122, 204,
129, 130; mapping exercise 230
123–126, 123, 125, 126; Crown Sky Garden (US) 95–96
recommended reading on 15, 204 cultural experiences see historic/cultural
annotated sketches 9, 14, 30 experiences
architecture 8, 108, 166, 168, 232;
indigenous 144; and smell 181; dance 38, 163, 164, 167
and taste 194 Darowski, Jacob 171–172, 189–190, 201
audio recording 38, 184 deaf people 36
AutoCAD 10, 15 Dee, Catherine 9, 15, 146, 204, 230, 232
axonometric drawing 38, 45, 108 Delhi (India) 91–92
design education 212–222, 230–232;
beef platter, analysis of 199–200 and accessible/inclusive design
Behnke, Jonathan 213 214; and drawing 212–216,
Benjamin, Walter 134, 205 217–220; drawing neglected
Bennett, Wayne 6 in 9–10; and fear of failure
Berger, John 6, 205, 230 217–220; and learning through
Biddulph, M. 4 repetition 214; and multisensorial
birdsong 8, 36 literacy 212; and multisensorial
blind people see visually impaired people perception 8, 218; and
blindfolds 62, 146, 148, 154, 167, 218 multisensorial teaching checklist
block diagrams 31 221–222; online 217, 220; and
bodily experience 4, 6, 8, 146, 166, 167, 212 playfulness/experimentation 220;
body space, tactile 155–158, 155, 157–158 and reading space 9; and site
book exchanges 137–138 immersion 8, 12, 220; and skill
Boston (US) 87–88 training 214–216; and syllabus
Bourbonne, A. 16 design 216–217; and visual literacy
brain 10, 12, 19, 23 books 230 design ideas 14, 15, 31,
Brumberger, E.R. 10 32, 214 design phase 12, 20
design phases/process 27–34;
Campbell, Marissa 109, 113–114, 125, 127, final design 27, 34, 34; ideation 12,
145, 157–158, 173, 197–198, 27, 33, 33, 45; recording see
215 recording; site analysis see site
Canada 7, 62, 133, see also Vancouver analysis; site immersion see site
Cen, Vicky 139–140, 161–162 immersion; synthesis 27, 31, 32, 32
Cerwén, Gunnar 168 design programs 9, 32
chair, sensorial design of 47–48 design proposals 33, 34
Chen, Mingjia 151–152 Diagonal Records 167
Chicago (US) 95–96 diagrams 9, 14, 31, 32, 34, 36, 45;
China 63–66, 64, 65, 66 analytical 38

236
 digital design tools 4, 9, 14, 15, 30, 36, 170, flavour see flavour; and smell 94,
214; and design education 214, 182; and taste rave exercise
218, 232; and hand drawing, 195–200, 195, 197–198, 199–
compared 10–12, 11, 106; 200
photography 132 fountains 69, 75, 76, 76, 77, 77, 78, 78, 80,
digital devices 146, see also smart phones; 85, 88, 92, 96
tablets
digital modelling 31, 34, 38 Gagnon-Creeley, Michelle 131, 133, 141,
drawing 4, 10, 12, 15, 106, 212–216; 163
axonometric 38, 45, 108; elevation Gao, Kemeng 169, 185–186
31, 45, 108; and fear of failure Garden of Five Senses (India) 91–92
217–220; gestural 5; hand/digital, gardens see parks/gardens
compared 10–12, 11, 15, 106; gazebos 62
and ideation 33, 33; and Germany 93–94, 107
learning through repetition 214; gestural drawings 5
neglected in design schools Google Maps 10
9–10, 217–218; orthographic Gram, Yette 137–138
32, 108, 234; as personal response Grand Tour 108
10; perspective 31, 38, 45, 108, grass 88, 98, 146; olfactory experience of
234; recommended reading on 182, 183
203; and site analysis 31; and Graves, Michael 108, 204
tactile boards 153, 154; tools 32,
see also diagrams; sketching; visual Habjanic, Rozman/Habjanic, Gasper 220
notes hand use exercise 147–152, 147, 149–150,
Drazil, David 214, 220 151–152
drinking object, design of 201, 202 Hart, Samantha 183
drones 38, 134 Have, R. 32
healing see restorative gardens
echoes 167 hearing see sound
ecological aspects 8, 36, 62, 132 Henshaw, Victoria 62, 182, 188, 206, 232
Eins + Alles - Experience Field of the Senses Hidcote Manor Garden (Chipping
(Germany) 93–94 Campden, UK) 79–82, 80, 81, 82
elevation drawing 31, 45, 108 historic/cultural experiences 62, 63, 67, 71,
Elizabeth & Nona Evans Restorative Garden 75, 134
(US) 97 holistic approach 6, 8, 29
emotions 6, 24, 184 Holl, Steven 144
exploded view 31 Humble Administrator’s Garden (China)
63–66, 64, 65, 66
failure, fear of 217–220 Hutchinson, Edward 10, 15, 203, 230
Featherstone, Guy 167
fence, sensorial design of 49–50 ideation process 12, 20, 27, 33, 33, 45, 220,
Fender, Josh 159 233
field sketching see sketching inclusive design 214, 232
fieldwork 8 India 91–92
Fin Garden (Iran) 67–70, 68, 69, 70 industrial design 36, 192
fire alarms 36 initial design vision 20, 31
flavour 26, 167, 192–194, see also taste Instagram 132, 203, 220
Flores, M. 214, 220
food 42, 192–200, 197–198; architecture Japan 26, 36, 71–74, 89–90, 181
as 194; fake 193, 194, 202; and jazz album covers 167, 177, 178

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 Jenkins, Eric 9, 15, 104, 108, 122, 203, 230 drawing 12, 214; drawing/
Johnston, Lawrence 79 visualization tools 37, 38; and
multisensorial literacy, compared
Kang, Jian 232 14; and site immersion 8, 12
Katsura Imperial Villa Gardens (Japan) multisensorial recording 30
71–74 multisensorial teaching check list 221–222
Kessler, Berend 135, 199–200 Murcutt, Glen 144
Kükelhaus, Hugo 93 music 38, 65, 166, 167, 177, 178
Kyoto (Japan) 71–74
New York City (US) 169, 185–186
Landau, Steven 144, 154 Nietzsche, Friedrich 166
landscape architecture 8, 9, 34, 108, 168, Northcut, K.M. 10
192; recommended reading on 15;
teaching 212, 232 object design 194, 201, 202
Laseau, Paul 9, 104, 108, 122, 204, 230 oblique view 31
Latour, Bruno 12 observation 23, 24, 41–42, 43–44, 106,
Lipps, Andrea 57, 180, 182, 194, 202, 206, 154, 233; and design education
232 216, 217, 220
Lobmueller, Fabian 162 ofuro bathtubs 181
Lupton, Ellen 57, 146, 166, 167, 202, 206, Oizumi Ryokuchi Park (Japan) 89–90
232 Okanagan Valley (Canada) 7
olfaction see smell
McLean, Kate 62, 182, 188 one-point perspective 144
maps/mapping 30, 31, 32, 36, 38, 134, online teaching 217, 220
233; exercise in 123–126, 123, orange, experience of eating 197–198
125, 126; and smells 62, 182, 184 orthographic drawings 32, 108, 234
material collection 38 Osaka (Japan) 89–90
materiality 22, 53, 56, 76, 77, 146
May, John 10, 12 Pallasmaa, Juhani 4, 6, 8, 15, 24, 144, 167,
medical students 212 168, 180, 181, 230, 232
memory 6, 20, 24, 25, 26, 43–44; drawing parks/gardens 21–22, 22, 36, 40, 62–100,
7, 231; and smell 180, 184 167; Crown Sky Garden (US)
mindfulness 6, 8, 20, 24, 39 95–96; Eins + Alles - Experience
models 9, 38 Field of the Senses (Germany)
modernism 144 93–94; Elizabeth & Nona Evans
Monumental Garden of Valsanzibio (Italy) Restorative Garden (US) 97;
75–78, 76, 77, 78 Fin Garden (Iran) 67–70, 68,
Mooney, Patrick 181 69, 70; Garden of Five Senses
Moore, K. 9 (India) 91–92; Hidcote Manor
movement exercise 159–162, 159, 161, 162 Garden (Chipping Campden, UK)
multisensorial diagnostics 212 79–82, 80, 81, 82; Humble
multisensorial literacy 4, 20–24, 108, 232, Administrator’s Garden (China)
233; and initial design vision 20, 63–66, 64, 65, 66; Katsura
31; and multisensorial perception, Imperial Villa Gardens (Japan)
compared 14; and site immersion 71–74; Monumental Garden of
see site immersion; teaching 212, Valsanzibio (Italy) 75–78, 76, 77,
214; and textured surfaces 22; and 78; Oizumi Ryokuchi Park (Japan)
uses of senses 20 89–90; restorative 36, 95, 97;
multisensorial observation exercises 14, 36 and synthesizing checklist 53–56;
multisensorial perception 6, 13, 36, 218; and Villandry Gardens (France) 83–86,

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 84, 85, 86; water features in see scale 9, 20, 37, 45, 232
water features; William E. Carter Schafer, Raymond Murray 62, 168
School Sensory Gardens (US) Schulte-Fortkamp, Brigitte 232
87–88 seashells 145
participatory research 62, 182 section view 31, 38, 45, 108
paths, texture/materiality of 22, 56, 76, 77 seeing 4–10, 234; and drawing 12; history
pavilions 62 of 4; importance for designers of 8;
perception 6, 8, 12, 14, 23, 232; and as multisensorial 6, 8; and
interaction of senses 41–42, 43– perception 6; and pre-eminence of
44; and observation 23, 24; sight 4, 9
recommended reading on 15 senses 4–6, 15, 20, 25–26, 234; and
performance 14 brain 23; hierarchy of 4, 9, 14, 144,
pergolas 62 181; interconnectedness/interaction
perspective drawing 31, 38, 45, 108, 234 of 35, 39, 40, 41–42, 43–44, 167;
photography 8, 30, 36, 38, 45, 131–142, interpretation methods for 36;
234; annotated 136, 142; digital prioritizing importance of, checklist
132; limitations of 10; and passage for 46–56; and site immersion 8;
of time 132, 141–142, 141; see also specific senses
recommended reading on sensewalks 62; see also under smell; sound;
205; as visual thinking 132, 134, taste; touch
135–140, 135, 137–138, 139–140 sensorial design synthesizing list 45–56
photomontage see collage/photomontage Shepard, Gordon M. 192
Pierre, Kathryn 118, 119, 126, 195 shoelace, sound of 175
plan view 31, 38, 45, 108, 124 sight 103–142, 235; and brain 12, 23,
plants 79, 87, 124; and sight 55, 56, 88, 90, 25; and design context 36; in
124, 127, 128, 136; and smell 53, interaction with other senses 35,
56, 82, 98, 181; and sound 167; 40, 41–42, 43–44, 106; and one-
and touch 53, 56, 80, 90, 98, 146, point perspective 144; pre­
see also grass; trees eminence of 4, 9, 14, 144, 181,
podcasts 14 212; and recording tools 38; and
Puente, Valia 147 seeing, compared 6
site analysis 10, 15, 27, 29, 31, 31, 32, 36, 45
Ratzlaff, Jenna 115, 130, 155 site immersion 10, 15, 20, 22, 235; and
recording 14, 27, 30, 30, 37–38, 38, design education 8, 12, 220; as
234; and design education 212, design phase 27, 28, 29, 29; and
214, 216, 217, 218, 220; and interaction of senses 40; multiple
handheld digital devices 36; see repetitions of 29; and recording 30
also specific recording tools sketching 9–10, 14, 15, 30, 36, 104–122;
referential sketching 9, 104, 105, 106–120, analytical see analytical sketching;
234; adding dimension exercise annotated 9, 14; benefits of 12; and
115–120, 115, 117, 118, 119, design education 214–216,
120; line-drawing exercise 217–218; hand/digital, compared
109–114, 109, 111, 112, 113–114; 10–12, 11, 106, 214; referential see
recommended reading on 203 referential sketching
Reid, Jennifer 149–150 skill training 214–216
Renaissance 4, 144, 181 skin 25, 57, 144, 146, 214; and sound 166
restorative gardens 36, 95, 97 smart phones 36, 134, 146
Ruskin, John 194 smell 6, 8, 9, 14, 26, 179–190, 216; and
brain 23; cultural aspects of 181,
Sachs, Oliver 166 182; describing 182, 188;

239
 ephemeral/personal nature of food 193, 194, 202; on garden
180; and fire alarms 36; and sensewalks 74, 82, 86, 88, 90,
flavour 26, 167, 192–194; on 92, 94; importance of 192; in
garden sensewalks 66, 70, 74, interaction with other senses 35, 40,
78, 82, 86, 88, 90, 92, 94; in 41–42, 43–44; as multisensorial
interaction with other senses 35, 40, experience 192, 194; and object
41–42, 43–44; and memory/ design 194, 201, 202; recommended
imagination 180, 181, 184; reading on 206; recording tools for 38, see
overlooked in design 180, 181– also flavour
182; recommended reading on taste rave exercise 195–200, 195, 197–198,
206, 232; recording tools for 38; 199–200
smell notes exercise 183–186, temperature 26, 30
183, 185–186; and taste 192; in text 14, 30, 38, 216
urban environment 62, 181 3D modelling 34, 37, 45
smell maps 62, 182, 187–190, 187, 188–189 Tilley, Christopher 6
smell notes exercise 183–186, 183, 185–186 touch 4, 6, 14, 25, 143–164; and
smellwalks 62, 182, 188 blindfolding 146, 148, 154; and
Sontag, Susan 132, 205, 230 brain 12, 23; dancing/figure
sound 8, 9, 14, 26, 165–178; album art skating exercise 64, 163; on
exercise 177, 178; and blindfolding garden sensewalks 64, 68, 72,
62; and brain 12, 23; and deaf 76, 80, 84, 88, 90, 92, 94, 96;
people 36; in garden sensewalks hand use exercise 147–152, 147,
62, 65, 69, 73, 77, 81, 85, 88, 90, 149–150, 151–152; importance
92, 94, 96; in interaction with other of 144, 146; in interaction with other
senses 35, 40, 41–42, 43–44; and senses 35, 40, 41–42, 43–44;
listening skills 168, 206; music movement exercise 159–162, 159,
38, 65, 166, 167, 177, 178; 161, 162; recording tools for 38;
recommended reading on 205– tactile body space exercise
206; recording 30, 38, 156, 155–158, 155, 157–158; tactile
170, 176, 184, 216; and space drawing board exercise 153, 154;
167; and synesthesia 167; tuning in textured surfaces 22, 56, 157–158
exercise 169–174, 169, 171–172, trees 70, 92, 94, 124, 128, 167
173, 174; and urban environment Treib, Marc 10, 15, 230
166, 168, 176; wind play exercise Tufte, Edward 57, 124
175, 176 tuning in exercise 169–174, 169, 171–172,
soundscapes/soundwalks 168, 170 173, 174
Suzhou (China) 63–66, 64, 65, 66 typing, sound of 173
Swailes, Janet 8, 15, 204, 214, 230, 232
synesthesia 167 United States (US) 87–88, 95–96, 97–98,
synthesis (design phase) 27, 31, 32, 235; 185–186
checklist for 45–56 urban environment 8, 15, 232; smells in 62,
synthesis (perception) 39, 41–42, 43–44 181, 182; sounds in 167, 168, 176

tablets (digital tool) 14, 36, 106, 136, 217, van den Toorn, M. 32
232 Vancouver (Canada) 62, 123, 130, 171–172,
tactile body space exercise 155–158, 155, 187, 189–190, 219
157–158 Verona (Italy) 194
tactile drawing boards 153, 154 video 8, 14, 36, 38, 45, 216; 3D 34
taste 6, 9, 14, 26, 191–202, 216; and brain Villandry Gardens (France) 83–86, 84, 85,
23, 192; and colour 194; and fake 86

240
 vision see sight
visual acuity 9, 104, 108, 116, 235
visual literacy 4, 9, 12, 14, 104, 108, 232,
235; reading on 230
visual notes 8, 9, 15, 36, 38
visual perception 194
visual sense see seeing
visual thinking 132, 134, 135–140, 135,
137–138, 139–140, 212, 235
visually impaired people 49, 89, 154, 214,
232
Vogelzang, Marije 202

wall, partitioning, sensorial design of 51–52

Wansink, Brian 194
water features 68, 69, 80, 81, 83, 84, 85,
88; waterfalls 72, 72, 73, 73, see
also fountains
Wenwen Zhuang 112, 120, 129, 175
Westerkamp, Hildegard 62, 170, 176, 182,
205–206
wheelchairs 22, 214, 232
Whiston Spirn, Anne 132, 134, 205, 212, 230
wildlife 8, 36, 65, 81
William E. Carter School Sensory Gardens
(US) 87–88
wind, sound of 175, 176
Wright, Frank Lloyd 144, 204

Yaying Zhou 111, 117

YouTube 99, 132, 205, 220

Zumthor, Peter 144

241