Architecture as Experience: Reimagining Heritage Interpretation through Situated Perception The Case of the Barcelona Pavilion

Abstract

This article proposes a new methodology for mediating architectural heritage grounded in the situated experience of space. In contrast to traditional heritage interpretation models— which tend to prioritize historical, symbolic, or conceptual readings—the article argues that architecture reveals itself not by means of external explanations but through attentive bodily engagement with space.
The proposal is articulated around the concept of the Diffuse Museum, understood not as an institution but as a pedagogical strategy that activates architectural and urban space as an open, distributed museum shaped by perception. In this framework, architectural sites become interpretive artefacts in their own right: they are encountered in situ, through movement, orientation, atmosphere and material presence. The city thus becomes a didactic landscape n which meaning arises from direct experience.
These ideas are examined through an experimental audio guide designed for the Barcelona Pavilion (Mies van der Rohe and Lilly Reich, 1929). The device structures the visit through verbs, bodily positions and shifts in attention, encouraging visitors to perceive the architectural phenomena as they unfold. Rather than transmitting information, it activates perception as a mode of knowing, enabling a more reflective and intimate encounter with space.
The article invites are thinking of how architectural knowledge is transmitted to the public, calling for forms of mediation that prioritise attentive presence and embodied perception. Altogether, this approach seeks to foster more inclusive and sensitive interpretations of the environment —interpretations that ultimately favour its preservation, transformation and revaluation as an essential component of our shared cultural existence and identity.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.20365/disegnarecon.35.2025.5