Speaker #0Hi everyone, I'm Chiara. I'm an architecture student and art lover, and honestly, just someone who is endlessly curious about the world. I've always loved asking questions, the small one we never really think about, the one behind the places we visit, the building we walk through, or the artworks we stop in front of without knowing why. And I thought, why not create a space where we can explore those things together? So this podcast is simple, it's for everyone. You don't really need to know anything about art or architecture, but just a bit of curiosity or the desire to understand the world around you in a different way. Here, I will talk about ideas that inspire me, stories behind spaces and artworks, and sometimes I will invite people, like architects, creatives, or just people who see the world differently, to share the way they think. So if you're here, I hope you will discover a perspective you didn't expect and maybe even start noticing things you never paid attention to before. So welcome to Beyond the Blueprints. This is the very first episode and I wanted to start with something that feels personal but also universal, a feeling we all had even if we never really knew how to explain it. You know how some places just stay with you? A room, a street or a smell, the way lights touch a wall one afternoon and suddenly, years later, it all comes back like it it never left. Today we're talking about that. The art of remembering places. Why some spaces follow us through life. Why others disappear instantly. And what it says about memory, emotion and the way we experience the world. Let's dive in. So let's talk about the places we never forget. It's strange isn't it? We forget birthday, we lose our keys, we can remember what we ate two days ago, but somehow, a womb. we saw once 10 years ago stay perfectly alive in your mind why does that happen for me the first example is always the same my grandmother's kitchen and i feel like everyone has that one room from childhood often a kitchen for some reason not a living room not the corridor the kitchen and it's funny because that room usually wasn't extraordinary it wasn't the prettiest or the biggest, but it was full of sensations, smells, routines. voices, warms. And apparently, smell is the fastest way to unlock a memory. It goes straight to the emotional part of the brain without even passing through logic. So maybe that's why those spaces stay with us. But then there are the places that don't make sense at all. Like a staircase you walked on once, or a bus stop where nothing happened, a hotel corridor you crossed half asleep and for some reason your brain just went okay Keep this one, and I love that, because it shows that the place itself wasn't necessarily special, but you were experiencing something special in that moment. Maybe you were anxious, excited, lost, or in love, overwhelmed, and your brain decided this matters, remember it. There's something fascinating researchers discovered recently. The brain has a tiny region called the parahippocampal. place area literally a zone dedicated to recognizing places and that's crazy is that it activates even when the place is unreal if you imagine a room you've never been in or if you dream of a corridor that doesn't exist this area lights up as if you were actually standing there and it means your brain doesn't just store spaces it creates them architect design buildings but your mind designs the versions we keep inside us. So place isn't only something we remember, it's something we rebuild every time we think about it. There's this idea everyone, the brain doesn't store spaces as images, it stores them as sensations. Like light, temperature, sound, texture or smell. So when you remember a place, you're actually remembering a tiny emotional atmosphere. Almost like a one second film. And that's why memories of spaces are sometimes blurry. You don't remember the dimensions or the materials, you remember the vibe, which is where architecture becomes fascinating to me. It makes me wonder, as designers, are we trying, secretly, to create places people will remember? Not because they're spectacular, but because they touch something in them. A memorable space is rarely the most beautiful one. Often it's something incredibly small like a shadow or a view that appears suddenly when you turn a corner. There is even research showing that your brain gets a memory boost when something's unexpected happen in the space. A sudden change in light, a shift in scale, a sound you didn't anticipate. It's the surprise that locks the moment in. And what I find even more beautiful is when you remember a place, you're not really remembering the architecture. You're remembering who you were inside that architecture. Like what you felt, what you were. going through what was changing in you. The place is just the frame. Two people can stand in the exact same room and live with completely different memories of it. So today I want to explore that relationship between space and memory. Why certain places stay with us, how our senses build this internal map of the world and how architecture quietly becomes part of our emotional life. And maybe, just maybe, after this episode, we'll start remembering places a little differently. And I think the real message of this episode, especially for a young architect like me, or maybe like some of you listening, is that we have to return to the basics, to remember why we chose this field in the first place. Yes, architecture is about function, about solving problems, about making things work, but it also about giving meaning, about creating an emotion that might touch someone quietly, even just once. So maybe before starting any project, we should all ask ourselves the same question. How am I going to reach people? What is going to stay with them? Why will spark their curiosity? How can this place become, even for a few seconds, a tiny chapter in someone's life? Because architecture isn't just a facade or a plan, it's a world. A world we build piece by piece, light by light, silence by silence. A world full of stories, some obvious, other invisible, hidden in the details, waiting to wake up inside someone who walks through at the right moment. And what fascinates me is that this moment, that perfect timing, is something we can never fully control. We can decide how we'll be moved. and how won't. And maybe that's the beauty of architecture and arts, they're accessible to everyone but personal to each of us. We can design, draw, plan, anticipate but what touches someone depends on their life, their memories, their state of mind that day. So I think the role of the architect isn't to force an emotion, it's to offer possibilities, openings, moments that might become meaningful. atmospheres that for some people could turn into memories spaces that leaves room for who they are what they feel and what they were living through and maybe the most powerful architecture isn't the one that tries too hard to be noticed but the one that leaves space for the person who walk into it the one that feels honest in these materials its light is proportioned because you can't fake many things, but you can't fake atmosphere. The body senses it before the mind even begins to understand. So, yes, we build to shelter, to protect, to organize. But I think we also build to accompany moments of life, to create places where something can happen, where someone can find themselves, where one small detail, like a shadow or a smell or a sound, might become a memory. And if a space manages to do that, then... It's already fulfilled its purpose. There's something I keep coming back to, especially when I think about memorable places. This idea that architecture isn't just something we look at, it's something we feel, almost physically. And honestly, no one talks about this better than Peter Zamtor. If you don't know him, he's a Swiss architect, super quiet, super humble, but he's... buildings are like emotional experiences. He says something I love, that what matters most in architecture is not the shape, not the size, not even the style, but the atmosphere. The thing you can't draw, the thing you can photograph, the thing you can only feel when you're there. And I think that's exactly what this episode is about. Atmosphere, the invisible layer of a place. some thorough designs building they don't try to impress you they try to touch you he uses materials that age light that moves slowly texture that you hand want to follow sounds that echo just a little spaces that make you breathe differently and that's when it hits you. This is the secret. And this is why we remember certain places so deeply, I think, because they made us feel something without forcing it. They didn't shout, they whispered, and they slowed you down for a second. They made you notice yourself. I remember visiting one of his projects once and honestly nothing happens, like no grand entrance, no no crazy roof, no shiny detail. But trust me, the second I stepped inside, everything got quieter. The light softened, the air felt thicker, the materials were warm, almost comforting. And suddenly, without thinking, I slowed down. My shoulder dropped and I thought to myself, okay, remember this. And I think that moment matters because most of the spaces we live in today are loud, fast. busy and bright and they're designed to be efficient not emotional so when a place gives you even three seconds of presence your mind holds on to it because it's rare and that brings me back to something i find fascinating the places we remember the most are not always the dramatic ones not always the iconic ones sometimes it's just a room where you felt safe Or maybe the bench where you finally said something you were afraid to say. And the architecture guides us without even noticing. It becomes the background of our emotions. And without meaning to, it becomes part of our identity. Which is crazy when you think about it. That a wall or a ceiling, a shadow can become part of someone's life story forever. And as an architecture student, something... I keep thinking about is how differently people react to the same space. The tiny details that catch my attention, like a material change, a shift of scale, a shadow in a corner, those things make me curious. They make me wonder, why did the architectures this? Why were they trying to make us feel? Was this meant to guide us, comfort us, and settle us? was it simply a fox night shows that accidentally become emotional and i love that because it reminds me that architecture is never experienced the same way twice two people can walk into the exact same room and have completely opposite reactions one might feel safe another might feel anxious another feel overwhelmed it's the same walls the same light the same materials but not the same bodies not the same memories not the same inner world it's like therapy room for example i think most of us imagine them as warm soft quiet spaces where you can relax almost like a safe little cocoon but for some people feel more comfortable in a space that's minimal neutral almost impersonal for them that's is what feel safe not the softness but the neutrality so how do we design for all these different needs? How do we build spaces that welcome people you don't feel the same way, who don't respond to the same cues? That's where I think architecture becomes almost a science of empathy. It's not just about creating one perfect atmosphere, it's about creating the conditions for multiple atmospheres to exist. I think it's about giving options, not to control the emotion, but to let each person find the one that fits them. And I found that beautiful, the idea that a space can adapt silently to however enters it, that architecture doesn't dictate how you shall fell, but gives you enough clues, enough texture, enough gentleness or enough neutrality so that you can find your own place inside it. Because maybe memorable architecture isn't the one that picks. one emotion and force it on everyone. Maybe it's the one that leaves room for the complexity of being human. The one that understands that people carry different stories, different scores, different memories and still manages to hold all of them. And before I finish this episode, there is one more thing I've been thinking about. If places stay with us, then maybe it's not just architecture may be Art works in exactly the same way. You know when you're in a museum, not even in a deep analytical mode, just walking around not expecting anything and suddenly a painting stops you, just stops you, like or a sculpture. a photograph anyway and you have no idea why you can't explain it but something's in your respirers okay this one remember this it's the same mechanism the same emotional spark the same invisible conversation between you and something outside of you a color a texture a face or silence and that's why i think art is and should always be accessible to everyone Because it gives us a change to meet ourselves, to feel something that maybe changes us a little, even if we don't notice it right away. There is an artist I love, actually my favorite one. It's a surrealistic painter named Victor Brunner. And I couldn't even tell you exactly why, but his work counts me. It feels like traveling without moving. It's soft colors melting into... each other is creating a mood that's both strange and incredibly soothing. Almost like his paintings are suspending between dreaming and waking. And that's interesting is that neuroscientists have studied this. They found that when we look at an artwork that resonates with us, the brain activates areas linked to personal memory, imagination and emotion. Even if the artwork has nothing to do with our life, and it's called aesthetic empathy, our brain mirrors what you see and suddenly a painting becomes a place inside you, a space you enter and a space that enters you. That's why some artworks feel familiar the second you see them and others feel strange. Not in a bad way, but in a wake up, something's happening kind of way. And that's the magic of it. Whether it's a building or a painting, the ones we remember are the ones that make us feel seen. They reflect something, something we didn't even know was there. A memory, a fear or a hope, a version of ourselves that was sitting quietly in a corner waiting for us to noticing. And maybe that's why architecture and art matters more than we think, not because they're beautiful or impressive or intellectual but because they're capable of leaving a trace inside us a soft mark something that stays and the more i think about it the more i wonder we walk through places thinking we're the ones doing the visiting but maybe maybe it's the place that visit us maybe it's the painting that steps onto our memory sits down quietly and decided to stay sometimes for a year or sometimes for a lifetime. And when that's happened, that's architecture, that's art, not the wall, not the shape, not the color, but the part of us that wakes up when we met them. So thank you for listening to this first episode of Beyond the Blueprint. And if one place or one artwork or one tiny moment came to your mind while you were listening, keep it. It shows you for a reason.
