Science of the senses; informative Ted Talk

 

I have recently watched a Ted Talk that really helped me to solidify my idea of creating a sensorial landscape and my rationale behind creating one. In the talk, Architect Stefan Behling described sensorial stimulation as being as important as physical stimulation. He then uses the experiment of students being locked in a white room as an example. After 48 hours, candidates started to give up and hallucinate. I found it astonishing learning that hallucinations are a coping mechanism for our brain to fight the lack of sensorial stimulation, I had no idea. But what's even more interesting is that those sort of, almost hostile environments are part of our everyday lives; artificial environments are not only white rooms or cells but also offices. According to some statistics that he shared with us, 87% of US citizen spend their time indoors, including 6% which is in the car. That to me, suggests the reason why depression and anxiety numbers are higher than ever, which is nothing new to us, and although that is not the only reason, it certainly is an important one.

This Ted talks accentuates the importance of Biophilic design, of fresh air as well highlighting the subject of sustainability. He also talks about the variation, the sensorial journey that our brain wants throughout the day, stating that ''stimulation should vary and oscillate throughout the day'' and this is fundamentally what my BF designed is based; a journey through the site to create sensorial responses for a satisfactory and unique experience, that will be beneficial for Gloucester's populations health and wellbeing.