An Architecture of Emotion, Antwerp
2020
An Architecture of Emotion acts as a critical
reappraisal of the value and necessity of both
collective and solitary emotional space within the
city, proposing an urban composition that
innately expresses a revised typology - a
synthesis of individual parts - initiating a
conversation regarding the future of emotion,
contemplation and memory within the
contemporary city.
Modern life offers conditions and ideals
that are far greater and more liberating than
those which our ancestors had lived under for the
entirety of human history. Yet, these freedoms
have created a new set of challenges placed upon
humanity - physiological and emotional
afflictions generated for us by secular life. These
unattainable ideals that were once satisfied or
countered by one’s belief in religious order are
now without antidote. Within an increasingly
secular society, that offers few spaces in which
our emotional needs are cared for or resolved,
the geography of emotional space must be
rethought and reconsidered.
Seven scattered chapels form a
constellation at the heart of the existing block,
fed into by four gardens, unique in character, and
screened from the street by a series of modest gatehouses that address the immediate context of
the block. Each chapel serves to offer a space in
which one may seek comfort, solace or
celebration: spaces that aim not at a practical or
prescriptive purpose but in atmosphere, scale and
material expression elicit and sustain an
emotional and spiritual need - a place of
quietness within the city, in which people can
feel, contemplate and grieve.
The largest chapel, dependence, acts as the
nucleus of the site, providing an architectural and
programmatic centre to the project. It’s
constituent parts, housed within great volumes of
earth, serve a more definitive purpose, providing
a washroom and kitchen for use prior to
participating in a collective meal that the
building is designed to support. The architectural presence is raw,
constructed of earth, concrete and stone softened
only by the landscape of the gardens that
surround it.
The paths that run through each of
the gardens are indirect and meandering,
intended to encourage slowness and interaction
with the landscape that acts as a bridge between
the city and the chapels, tempering the
experience, instilling within a silence and
reverence.