The theme of this research is the study of how things take form in experience, consciousness and language. In large part, it explores the identification and the naming of ephemeral event phenomena that are as of yet unnamed, a process of becoming I describe as symmetry-breaking. This exploration is pursued within the framework of a Lived Spatial Inquiry called Experimental Poiesis, a particularly experimental form of making where inquiry is the formal philosophical and poietic tool where the original matrix of the site in question is embedded in what is made. The methods of this inquiry facilitate both the study and the subversion of normal habits of language-focused perception and are called Heuristics—experimental aesthetic practices that are site-adjustable and engaged iteratively, where the results of one experiment become the starting point of the next. Spatial Poetries is the name I have given to the results of these experiments, hybrid in form and prompting shifts in lived experience in the reader. This thesis pays homage to Observations upon Experimental Philosophy (1666), by the Duchess of Newcastle Margaret Cavendish, as well as The Manual of Scientific Enquiry; Prepared for the Use of Officers in Her Majesty’s Navy; And Travellers in General (1859), edited by Sir John F. W. Herschel. In addition, I engage with the work of Gregory Bateson, John Dewey, Ian Hacking, Dalibor Vesely and Roberto Casati, and have found resonance with practices such as medieval monastic rhetoric as presented in the writings of Mary Carruthers, the work of the architecture school Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso in the Ciudad Abierta (Open City), and the site-based poetic and philosophical works of Ian Hamilton Finlay. As a hybrid object, the thesis contains a manual for the discovery, analysis and naming of ephemeral phenomena. The Manual is composed of images, text, audio, video, and diagrams. As an assemblage, it both documents a process of inquiry and attempts to provide a taxonomy and rationale for that process and is presented in the form of the Atlas of Experimental Poiesis, a central contribution of this research. This Atlas allows for a process of philosophic reflection that feeds back into and has the capacity to enrich lived spatial-aesthetic experience of readers in general. In specific, it offers a vocabulary and visual structure to undertake the processes of observation, detection and creation of new forms, and the challenge of bringing those experiences to language.

Since the early 20th century, dramatic creativity has been limited by theatre architecture. Evidence for this is that innovative drama will rarely take place in conventional theatre buildings. The evolution of theatre architecture is traditionally viewed as fundamentally linear with classical models being modified in response to social change and technical advances. Today this paradigm continues as the accepted basis for architectural design. Examination of a range of exemplars using different techniques - historical and scientific - shows why this idea and approach persists, as it reveals other historical models that could be a reference for new approaches to designing theatre buildings/places. Informed by this work - and parallel to it - a design experiment in practice operates as a critique of today’s approach. The work as a whole looks to identify the social logic of theatre architecture in the context of the design process. It examines theatre’s ritual base and presents the dramatic event as a societal structuring device. The findings suggest that for innovation to be more than a one-off incident a different architectural-education and professional model is required to that currently in operation. A framework closer to medical practice is proposed, where architectural specialists are trained and experimental monitoring and assessment is set against a body of (typological) laboratory and desktop research. Practice demonstrates however that additionally for theatre architecture - and this is probably true of other specialist architectural fields - an interdisciplinary experimental approach must be taken if innovation is to be maximised while risk is minimised.

This study examines the change in the space heating energy consumption and its associated cost and carbon emissions following retrofit energy efficiency upgrade. 3 to 4 week fuel consumption and temperature data were collected from some 1500 dwellings over two successive winters in 2001/2002 and 2002/2003. The case study dwellings were occupied by elderly householders or families with young children and were either awaiting or had received a combination of draught proofing, insulation and central heating measures under England’s Warm Front Scheme. The findings show that the Warm Front Scheme resulted in a mean increase of 1.6 °C in indoor temperature and a mean increase of 12 % in fuel consumption. Nevertheless, the switch from electricity to gas for space heating following the introduction of gas boilers resulted in a mean reduction in heating cost by 7 %. The scheme was found to have negligible impact on carbon emissions. Characteristic differences were observed with individual energy efficiency measures. Central heating resulted in the greatest temperature rise by 2.3 °C followed by insulation by 0.7 °C with a negligible impact from draught proofing. Clear evidence was found in householders increasing the demand temperature following the introduction of a central heating system while no evidence of this was found following the introduction of insulation. In terms of energy use, insulation resulted in a mean saving of 9 % but fell short by 74 % to 84 % from the theoretical prediction while central heating resulted in a mean increase of 29 % in the energy consumption. Draught proofing was found to have little impact on the energy use. When examined in terms of energy cost, insulation and central heating all resulted in mean cost savings of 13 % and 9 % respectively but falling short by 55 % to 72 % and 57 % to 82 % compared to their respective theoretically predicted mean cost savings. Insulation also resulted in mean carbon emissions saving of 13 % but fell short by 56 % to 73 % from the theoretical prediction while central heating resulted in insignificant carbon emissions saving. Combining insulation with central heating was found to be beneficial in terms of mitigating the energy consumption rise associated with central heating from 29 % down to 16 % while maximizing the temperature gain by as much as 3.1 °C.

This thesis is an exploration of identity, public space and design in the town of Barking, London England, where a new Town Square was produced between 2000 and 2010. Designed by muf architecture/art (public realm) and Alford Hall Monaghan Morris Architects (buildings), the Barking Town Square, as will be seen in this research, is a telling moment of urban and public space development of its period. Consequently, the project raises significant questions about the evolving identity of its participants and publics, the value of public space in the contemporary city, and the relationship between design authority and public participation. It develops the concept of dialogue, from the Bakhtinian theory of dialogism, as a conceptual paradigm for identity, public space and design, recasting the initial investigation into an exploration of alterity (individuals and publics cannot be conceived outside of their situated relations to others), spatial heteroglossia (public space as a production of different discourses) and practical ambivalence (the blurring of boundaries to activate the social and political potential of design). The thesis thus investigates, in Bakhtinian terminology, how different voices inflect the polyphonic landscape of public space, particularly in the context of urban regeneration and the relationship between ideal projections (of publics, of public spaces, of design concepts) and their challenge in the everyday use and management of such places. Furthermore, the inherent ambivalence of dialogue—particularly its openness and the way it allows contradictions to co-exist—is traced throughout as a common thread uniting the questions raised by the Barking Town Square project and those of theory. The methods of investigation emphasise interviews, participant-observation and fieldwork, capturing a project that existed for the duration of my research in a state of becoming.

This thesis explores non-linear geometric texts and narratives in literature and architecture and the experience of space that is facilitated by them. The research focuses on the palindrome because it is a non-linear mathematical/geometrical device that is found both in literature and architecture. In language, the palindrome is expressed in the geometrical arrangement of words, letters or concepts in the text or the narrative; and, in architecture, as mirrored symmetries or palindromic proportions, measurements and distributions of elements in drawings and buildings. The primary aim of the thesis is to explore the spatial qualities of palindromes, and the experience of those qualities not only in text but also in architecture. This dissertation thus consists of two parts: the first examines Spatial Palindromes in terms of the spatial structures of selected texts and considers their relation to architecture; and the second examines Palindromic Spaces in terms of the spatial experiences created by and through palindromes in text and architecture. The first part, Spatial Palindromes, constructs an original history of the spatial qualities of palindromes by looking at the theory guiding the use of non-linear devices in texts and architecture. This history moves from the use of palindromes in the work of classical figures and scholars (Orpheus, Pythagoras and Vitruvius), to the Medieval and Renaissance practice of mnemonics (Frances Yates, Mary Carruthers), to early twentieth-century structural linguistics (Ferdinand de Saussure) and the group OuLiPo (Raymond Queneau, Franyois Le Lionnais) and, finally, to late twentieth-century post-structural linguistics (Jean Baudrillard.) The thesis argues that palindromes create spatial experiences both in texts and architecture. For this reason the second part, Palindromic Spaces, studies the nature of spatial experience in the fictions and designs of Stephane Mallarme, Jacques Polieri, Georges Perec, and Daniel Libeskind. According to Baudrillard the poetic space, hidden or revealed by the anagram and palindrome, is where the solid structure of language is "exterminated." This act of extermination, or the poetic space that palindrome reveals in language, opens up perception, memory and recollection to a spatial experience "that incorporates the recession of outcomes ad infinitum;" a self-generated, self-consumed or self-reflective conception of history and space that this thesis aims to explore in architecture.

Human beings have a dialectical relationship with their environment. On one hand, we create it daily with our actions; scholars now agree that the way we inhabit our cities and dwell in our homes shapes these sites as much as their physical forms do. On the other hand, our environment mediates our practice, amongst other things by stipulating what is or isn’t deemed appropriate behaviour in a particular location. Space is a powerful tool and we are easily kept “in our place” by social and cultural conventions: being a woman, being a citizen, being at home etc. all carry expectations of compliant spatial conduct. Where spatial practice is ideally dynamic and liberating, its constructive potential is thus frequently suppressed and regimented to support a larger, usually politically motivated narrative – a narrative which then strongly influences a predominant telling of history. This thesis closely considers one such historical “remote-controlled” spatial concept: that of rootedness in the nineteenth-century Unites States. In these 100 years, America spatialised itself, developing from a collection of former colonies into a powerful nation state defined through its territorial expanse and cohesion. Crucial in securing this unifying space were the numerous migrants encouraged to move West by a government portraying the land as the single and unifying root bed for the (still diverse) American nation. Mobility was a part of the imperial project of expansion and popular US opinion still perceives the pioneers as having grounded the republic in the nourishing Western soil on which a civilised, progressive and distinctly American culture consequently flourished. As a spatial scholar, however, I see mobility as a form of practice which does not lend itself to streamlined rhetorics as much as many others. Movement necessarily implies trespass - a traveller must cross thresholds and boundaries, spatial transgressions which encourage social and cultural contestation. This Ph.D. project makes use of the challenging nature of mobility, of its ability to review accepted norms through spatial practice. It looks at the nineteenth-century Western migrants’ daily spatial practice to consider how mobility carried an authorised narrative, but also how the men and women wrote a parallel history of American identity and belonging. The value of the research is twofold. In the first instance, using a spatial lens allows me to offer an alternative reading of how the mobile inhabitants of the trans- Mississippi West influenced the cultural and social constructs in which the United States of America has long perceived itself to be rooted. My focus in this parallel or other history will be on heterogeneity, on the (fluid) roles of individuals in society, on the reciprocity between sedentarist and mobile culture. Secondly, I aim to bring the insights gained from the analysis of a particular mobile community and their practice back to academic spatial discourses. My focus here will be on place-making and home-making as acts of mobility.

The thesis explores the nature and impact of liquid concepts with a particular focus on liquid architecture, dually interpreted through the thinking of Gilles Deleuze and the cinematic works of David Lynch. The text begins with a consideration of how architecture was until recently expected to be stable and solid. Following this, it introduces liquid concepts and what can be understood by this term, before discussing the stimuli that led to the expression of liquid thinking through liquid architecture. An introduction to the thinking of Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari follows, with a selective focus placed on ideas of relevance to liquid concepts. The central part of the text discusses liquid architecture, mentioning several key figures within the movement, including Lars Spuybroek, Kas Oosterhuis and Marcos Novak. This is followed by the presentation of several projects, both those of other architects and the projects forming part of this design thesis. The latter section is concerned with the definition of cinematic space and its function, and the work of David Lynch. It considers connections between Lynch and liquid concepts, and presents relevant themes and tools that feature prominently in his films. The final part of the thesis is dedicated to a discussion of the Liquid House design project, exploring the influences on the design process of the various strands considered in this thesis, and in particular of the work of Deleuze and of Lynch, ultimately affirming that the project is liquid in its design approach. The text concludes that while liquid architecture is mostly concerned with matters relating to design, liquid concepts are about ways of thinking, and further, the current expressions of liquid architecture are not the full extent of the developments in architecture, which may be expected to become even more liquid.

What do we really understand about museum architecture? How are museums made through design, but also through use? What are the motivations of those involved in museum projects and how is the physical stuff of museums implicated in the creation of professional identities and social relationships? Recent decades have witnessed an international explosion of museum building, expansion and renovation and the development of a sub-discipline in museum studies as museum professionals and academics have sought to understand the myriad issues involved in capital development. Despite the number of texts and events dedicated to planning successful capital projects, there has been little detailed exploration of the nature of museum architecture. Dominant understandings of museum architecture as the aesthetic outcome and activity of the architect continue to inform much writing about museum buildings, and the histories these texts construct about museums and how they are made, continue to influence professional attitudes towards capital development projects. This thesis utilises an architectural history of one museum – the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool – in order to explore the nature of museum architecture and the multiple ways in which it is produced. Driven by critical thinking around the social production of architecture, the thesis develops a biographical approach to unearth detailed histories of architectural change and development and provide glimpses of tangled stories of occupation and use revealing of social and professional relationships and of the politics and tensions behind architectural development. Drawing on research in museum studies, architectural history and theory as well as biography, autobiography and life writing, the thesis explores aspects of the subjects, methods and outcomes of architectural history and argues for detailed and nuanced histories of museum architecture which expand our understanding of how museums are made. Biography emerges as a route towards meaningful histories of change with the potential to provide some sense of the ordinary lives, the human bodily experiences that have made and remade the architecture of the museum throughout its ‘life’ and tell new stories of museum architecture necessary for the ongoing development and, potentially, radical remaking, of the physical stuff of museums and galleries.

This PhD challenges existing understandings of post-colonial architecture and urban space by including the contestations of ethnic minority in the nation-building process. It takes Kuala Lumpur, the capital city of Malaysia, as its primary site of investigation. The thesis challenges conceptions of the colonial/post-colonial city which focus on giving voice to the once-colonized nation through binary construction of colonizer/colonized, and yet keeping the ethnic minority groups in the shadow of the nation. In particular, by including the voice of the Malaysian Chinese in the nation-building, this study contests the conception of national identity and decolonisation in Malaysia and seeks to be a political project of resistance to hegemonic construction of race, culture, identity and space. The thesis has two major lines of inquiry. First, it examines how racialisation has taken shape in colonial and post-colonial state architectural projects in the city of Kuala Lumpur and new capital city of Putrajaya, which represents national identity and signifies cultural dominance of the Malays, while marginalising the Chinese. Second, it traces the spatial negotiation and contestation of the Chinese community. The PhD examines how the Chinese used their marginal urban spaces – such as the Kuala Lumpur Chinese Cemetery and Chinatown – in order to negotiate their cultural identity and to contest the contemporary nationalism and multiculturalism.

Within post-war (1975–2000) and post-Syrian-occupied (1976–2005) Beirut, civic values are being challenged on a daily basis. In this particular post-war, post-occupied condition, when seven million cubic feet of ancient Beirut have been demolished and dumped into the water, architecture can no longer be compatible with conventional design principles, but may alternatively seek to look ‘critically at the obvious’1 through Neorealism in order to develop a new type of architect and architecture able to deal with such a circumstance. A similar condition may be experienced through considering the characteristics and techniques in Rome Open City (1945) by the Neorealist film director Roberto Rossellini; with makeshift studio space, no comprehensive cast of professional actors, no advanced lighting systems, one-page scripts, no formal camera framing, no perpetual recording of dialogue and no formal financial backing, Rossellini creatively documented post-World War II Italy and the devastating impact of the Fascist regime and Nazi occupation of Rome. As an architect living in post-war/post-Syrian-occupied Beirut, I believe the fifteenth-century drawing tools and techniques of the designer-architect2 are less useful in Beirut today. Rather, an investigation into the oeuvre of Neorealism and the formation of a ‘Neorealist Director-Architect’ (NrDA) model will attempt to offer relevant post-war architecture in Beirut. The research question raised is: to what extent can the gambits, devices and techniques of film history, with a focus on the Neorealist film-director Roberto Rossellini, serve as a model for the NrDA, providing an alternative model for the traditional designer-architect? The proposed NrDA shall utilize a set of both theoretical and practical tools derived from Neorealist film technique and adapted to architecture through the use of interviews, photography, film, animation, video and audio recordings, newspapers and current gossip and material reconstitution, as well as digital and physical modelling, to locate and record the various forms of myth and matter within Beirut. The new-found knowledge base and tool set are then applied in making the proposed ‘Municipal Structure of Negotiation’ (MSN) as an architectural testimony to the NrDA model.