The Appearances of Daylight – an educational method for studying daylight

Abstract

The central theme is daylight. In other words, seeing and sensing it, registering it through photographs and drawing the tangible conditions that form the framework for the appearances of daylight. Basically, it is about practising the ability to see differences – to see the differences in the daylight and thus heighten an awareness of how to choose to design with daylight in architecture. In educating architects, we are keenly aware of encouraging students to develop an awareness of the importance and effects of daylight. This paper will examine how the experience of daylight through a specific qualitative method can provide students with new knowledge through a phenological approach: gaining knowledge by studying the daylight in the home of each student where they live their daily lives, perhaps seeing the daylight or overlooking it. Their home becomes a laboratory for studying and documenting daylight through different formats and using different tools. There is a need to develop new teaching methods that can give students insight and tools for seeing daylight, founded on a belief that through this experience and knowledge they can design architecture with nuanced, diverse experiences of daylight. In a sustainable perspective, robust aesthetic sustainability must begin with the qualities of space, of which daylight is one of the most significant elements.