Sensing with More-than-Human Care: A Possible Shift in Architectural Aesthetics

Abstract

PurposeThis research aims to discuss possible aesthetic shift framed by care in architecture with a more-than-human approach, focusing on the potential involvement of neglected non-human entities in spatial designs. In this regard, this research encourages people to think about the relation between human and non-human through spatial practices, aiming to challenge human-centrism.Design/methodology/approachThis research examines the potential and critical participation of non-human entities in selected spatial practices. A multidisciplinary focus group interview was held, and a workshop was conducted by focus group participants on selected practices. As research methods, discourse analysis and comparative analysis are applied. With these analyses, a discussion is held by the researchers.FindingsWith the inclusion of non-human entities in the spatial practices over time, the aesthetic judgment of architecture is shifted in a caring manner. Aesthetics, which finds its place in both the human-centric and the more-than-human perspective, was evaluated as full of potential as a common ground with the critical participation of non-human entities in the collective spatial practices. The changing phenomenon of aesthetics is therefore found highly related to more-than-human discussions.Originality/valueThere are a few interdisciplinary studies on the intersection of more-than-human and architectural aesthetics debates. This research aims to challenge the conventional aesthetic means of architecture with an effort to bridge the gap between more-than-human aesthetics and architecture by producing new multidisciplinary discourses on more-than-human architecture.