Research into the Built Environment in Architectural Sciences

Research into the Built Environment in Architectural Sciences brings together thirteen chapters that examine the built environment as an object of theoretical inquiry, technical analysis, historical understanding and design. The volume moves from the conceptual to the urban. Its opening chapters ask how spatial experience becomes researchable, comparing phenomenological approaches in architectural research, and how ideology is produced and conveyed through the configuration, symbolism and atmosphere of spaces of worship. A theoretical reading of tectonic culture, drawing on new materialism and object-oriented ontology, then leads to questions of construction and material. The following chapters turn to heritage and building technology: the tectonic and a-tectonic layers of a rock-carved complex in Cappadocia revealed through digital documentation, discrete crack modelling of Hagia Sophia as a basis for conservation decisions, and a regional comparison of wall construction systems in traditional Turkish houses. Ecological design is addressed through biomimicry in the form-determination phase of facade design and through a visual-documentary framework that separates visible greenness from verifiable nature-positive evidence. The urban chapters examine the integration of a university campus with its city, the visual perception of a renovated coastal square in Istanbul and the transformation of shopping centres in Istanbul. The volume closes with architectural education, investigating daylighting pedagogy and conceptualising architectural travel as an intentional practice that builds precedent knowledge and the architect's Bildung. Combining theoretical, qualitative, numerical and documentary methods, the book offers researchers, educators, students and practitioners a cross-section of current architectural research and a shared ground for discussing how the built environment is studied, designed and preserved.