Christian Norberg-Shulz and Genius Loci
Christian Norberg-Schulz brought back the ancient notion of the genius loci or “spirit of place” into architecture. Thinking of architecture as concretizing the nature of a place, he wrote about experiential and psychic notions such as “existential foothold” and “existential space.” His idea foregrounds the fact that people strive to create meaningful existential spaces where they can get a foothold, where they can dwell. By employing examples such as the Saqqara pyramid and the Sea Ranch complex in California, he demonstrates architecturally what he feels is the nature of the site. “A phenomenology of place,” Norberg-Shulz asserts, “has to comprise the basic modes of construction and their relationship to formal articulation. Meaning and character cannot be interpreted in purely formal or aesthetic terms, but are . . . intimately connected with making” (65-66). Norberg-Schulz has taken the concept of “dwelling” from Heidegger’s essay “Building Dwelling
Thinking” and has related it to the concept of genius loci as follows:
Man dwells when he can orientate himself within and identify himself with an environment, or, in short, when he experiences the environment as meaningful. Dwelling therefore implies something more than ‘shelter’. It implies that the spaces where life occurs are
‘places’, in the true sense of the word. A place is a space that has character. Since ancient times the genius loci
, or ‘spirit of place’ has been recognized as the concrete reality man has to face and come to terms with in his daily life. (5)
Places, as Norberg-Schulz considers, are qualitative totalities where events
“take place,” where the different components relate to each other in a meaningful “Gestalt,” and where the whole is experienced as more than its

constituent parts. He believes that a place is a qualitative, integrated phenomenon, not to be reduced to any single property without losing its concrete nature. At this point, Norberg-Schulz breaks with functionalism and international style in architecture. He argues that “taking place,” with implications such as spatial distribution and dimensioning, should not be taken as universal in a quantitative, functional sense; it should be understood in accordance with different cultural traditions and different environmental conditions. “Similar functions,” as Norberg-Schulz notes, “even the most basic ones such as sleeping and eating, take place in very different ways, and demand places with different properties” (8). Such an attitude evidently runs counter to functional approaches that deny place its concrete “hereness” as well as its particular identity.
This identity is meant by the genius loci . All places have character; people perceive the characteristics of their environment as a kind of
“environmental image” which provides them with an orientation and a sense of security. Norberg-Schulz argues that “all cultures have developed systems of orientation . . . , spatial structures which facilitate the development of a good environmental image” (19). To a large extent, orientation is based on or derived from given natural features. There is a close relationship between orientation and identification, a meaningful relationship between people and the world they inhabit. It implies that the environment is experienced as meaningful.
As modifiers or designers, we concern ourselves with influencing the spirit of a place from the materials we choose, setting out spatial relationships, the building forms, to expressing the cultural idioms in design details, all in a desire to infuse a place with meaning. Norberg-Shulz therefore speaks of

man-made places relating to nature in three evolutionary ways: first, that man visualizes his understanding of nature; second, that man symbolizes his understanding of nature; and finally, that man creates a “micro-cosmos” from his understanding of the world. Yet, he reminds us that we tend to forget that all places, whether beautiful or foreboding, comfortable or oppressive, natural or man-made, and, today, real or virtual, embody a spirit which is known differently by different people and differently by the same people at different times. He further reminds us that we forget that our experience of place is influenced by our growing up and that we forget the power of our memories of senses—sounds, smells, feelings, tastes, sights—in framing our psychic and physical response.
It is noteworthy that the relationship between man and place is also elaborated by the notable geographer Yi-Fu Tuan, who highlights the importance of meaning and an insider’s view and describes place as humanized space.
The contrast of open space with enclosed, comforting areas enhances both. As a person’s emotional bond to a space increases, so do familiarity, comfort, and the sense of “insidedness” (Tuan, Space 12). Without personal control over space, this emotional bond is slow to develop. To create place,
Tuan suggests that memorable architecture should strengthen our memories, enhance the self, and provide layers of meaning to a space. He suggests that place is security and space is freedom: we are attached to the one and long for the other. He also describes his “topophilia” as the relations, perceptions, attitudes, values, and world-view that effectively bond people and place.
Analyzing the content of people’s memories of significant and recurring themes about space and place, he yields insights into fundamental life themes of sense of place, environmental mastery, privacy and autonomy. Yuan

employs many examples to show how sense of place is closely linked to our feelings. For example, the feeling of distress is related to placelessness, longing to attain a sense of place; the feeling of alienation is in line with rootlessness, which means discontinuity and change in the sense of place (Tuan,
Space 36).
Tuan shows the need for people to understand the significance of senses of place, for which places are not merely objects, but objects for the human subject. A sense of place can be conceptualized in terms of the structure of feeling, as a constituent of collective identity that functions primarily to create residential differentiation for most people in modern societies. Ultimately, sense of place contributes to safeguarding a region’s cultural heritage and promoting cultural awareness.