The Architectonics of Memory: On Built Form and Built Thought

Abstract

In order to understand the potential aesthetic effects the built environment may have on human feelings and attitudes, one must comprehend how architecture can intimately connect with the human mind. As an embodiment of our understanding of the mind, the classical art of mnemonics developed an architectonics of memory based on the idea of mental places , or loci , in which things could be stored. This is now known as the method of loci , a technique still found effective by contemporary psychologists. Further study of mnemonic theory—including constructs of modern art theory, philosophy and cognitive psychology, along with ideas developed by classical orators—suggests that mental organization structures itself in a fundamentally spatial manner. This common spatiality links mental functioning and architecture, and allows architecture to persuasively engage and influence the human mind.