serial vision visual dimension - urban design

2. The visual dimension
Architecture and urban design are among the very few truly inescapable – and,
therefore, public art forms.
urban design does not
afford such a choice “in their
daily activities, people must
pass through and experience
the public parts of the city
environment”.
While observers can choose whether or not to experience art, literature
and music,

3. Aesthetic appreciation has socially and culturally learnt components that go beyond simple
expressions of individual taste .
Aesthetic preferences:

4. Jack Nasar(1998) identified five attributes of “liked” environments”.
Disliked environments tended to have the opposites of these

5. Aesthetic preferences:
1. Naturalness :
environment that are natural or where there is a predominance of natural over built
elements.

6. Aesthetic preferences:
2. Upkeep/ civilities : environment that appear to be looked after and care for.

7. Aesthetic preferences:
3. Openness: the blending of defined open space with panoramas and vistas of pleasant
element.

8. Aesthetic preferences:
4. Historical significance/content: Fragrant history

9. Aesthetic preferences:
5. order : in terms of organization, coherence, legibility, clarity.

10. Urban experience:
As our experience of urban environment is a dynamic activity involving movement and
time, the urban experience of moving through space is an important part of the visual
dimension of urban design.

11. Serial vision:
Gordon Cullen (1961) conceived the concept of “serial vision”.
He said :
Urban experience is one of a series of revelations,
with delight and interest being stimulated by contrasts.

12. Gordon Cullen (1961) saw particular significance in the tension
between “hereness” and “thereness”

13. He considered :
the urban environment should be designed
from the point of view of the moving person.

14. Serial vision:
Cullen work showing how movement can be
read as a pictorial sequence.
He showed how our perception of time
passing and distance travelled differs from
reality.

24. Serial vision:
The development of new modes of travel
has provided additional ways of seeing,
engaging with and forming mental images of
urban environments:
• seen at different speeds
•With different levels of focus
•The pedestrian viewpoint is accompanied
by the freedom to stop and engage with
one’s surroundings.

25. THANK YOU 