Skin's Eyes: Architecture and the Senses

The Eyes of the Skin: Architecture and the Senses

Explore the relationship between architecture and sensory experience with this groundbreaking book's latest edition!

First published in 1996, The Eyes of the Skin instantly became a classic of architectural theory upon its release. The book posed a comprehensive and profoundly impactful question that would lead us to re-examine all our cognitive activities, from philosophy to art: Despite having five senses instead of one, why has one of them – sight – become so dominant in architectural culture and design? The rise of the digital medium and the pervasive influence of electronically transmitted images in every field make this question far more urgent and relevant today than when the book was first published.
According to Juhani Pallasmaa, the suppression of the other four sensory domains leads to the neglect of the multisensory character of human spatial experience, thereby both crippling humanity and weakening architecture's ability to inspire, engage, and celebrate the value of life in all its aspects; this is also the fundamental reason for the general impoverishment of our built environment.
In this revised and expanded edition, prepared based on the 4th English Edition of The Eyes of the Skin, a masterpiece that offers transformative insights and understandings and should be read by all architecture students as well as general readers, the reader will find: 
•    The author's latest views on the importance of place, unfocused perception, and existential experience;
•  Updates and elucidations emphasizing that the most important and influential sense in architecture is our sense of self in the world;
•    An updated Introduction addressing the groundbreaking nature of understanding the importance of existential sense today;
•    And Peter MacKeith's comprehensive essay, "A Door Handle, A Handshake," which serves as an introduction to Pallasmaa's thoughts on architecture and the nature of sensory experience, and an insider's testimony.
For a student reading it for the first time, The Eyes of the Skin is a moment of enlightenment. More than a quarter-century after its first publication, it continues to inspire with the fresh and powerful insights it offers about architecture.