05 Dec

How have the past fifteen weeks changed my outlook on architecture?

Three and a half months ago, when I thought of the Colosseum, I thought of Gladiator. I thought of a huge elliptical building that was used for gruesome entertainment organized by the emperor. After arriving in Rome however, I found it much more difficult to view the Colosseum in the same way. While in your mind you can view the place the way it has been envisioned in movies, the reality of the space is quite different in today’s world. There are no grand events taking place, no fights to the death, and no royalty. Instead there are tourists, lots and lots of tourists who come to this place for no real reason other than to view what still exists of this historic building. No matter what the original intentions were for the space, the architect could not have known how the spaces are used today. The architect has no control over where tourists gather, how they view the building or what the building is used for.

I have learned that architecture is never static, it cannot simply be considered under a single condition at a single point in time. It must be created knowing that people are the ones who develop the meaning of the space, not the architect. An architect’s intended use or meaning of a space means absolutely nothing if people do not inhabit the space in the intended way. I have learned that architecture is so much more than a building; it affects the way a society exists, the way they live, the way they interact and the way they grow.