Surrealizing the Memory House

Abstract

How can architects design more meaningful and narrative spaces using architectural memory? This question is examined by applying the lens of surrealism to issues of the architectural memory. The lens of the surreal and uncanny helps develop a cursory understanding of how these types of architectural memories are formed, communicated, recognized and reinterpreted into multitudinous architectural possibilities. This research attempts to find a language of icons or symbols that could, at least in a middle class Western culture, be applicable and meaningful to most people. This investigation reveals the importance of narrative in architecture and the architect’s role of editor in that narrative. This narrative touches on the desire for continuity with the past and the desire for a future that reinterprets and improves upon that past.