Enchantment lies at the intersection of possibility and imagination, where dreams of the future begin to take shape. In the field of architecture, each project is a testament to this potential, offering new visions that challenge the boundaries of what can be achieved. We often find enchantment  in unlikely settings. Nature, ruins, and temples have a captivating effect by removing us from the mundane struggles of daily life, transporting us to faraway places and bygone times, or connecting us to something greater than our mortality. Just as radio stations broadcast their signals regardless of whether we tune in, spaces designed with intention create atmospheres that exist independently of our awareness, though our perception of them varies based on our perspective. As architects, our role is to shape the mood of a space rather than control the mood within it. Hubert L. Dreyfus captures this distinction well:

Politicians, preachers and masters of ceremonies understand and manipulate the mood in the room. Architects, however, do something more basic and more powerful. They produce the mood of the room itself. The mood of the space trumps what is going on in the space. The mood of a towering cathedral nave remains reverential even if tourists, out of tune with the space, are snapping flash pictures.¹

When entering a cathedral, many visitors are mentally prepared to experience a sacred atmosphere. In contrast, spaces like schools, homes, or museums may not automatically evoke enchantment, as our expectations and experiences influence how we perceive them. Architects are trained to appreciate and respond to “the mood of the room”, noticing details such as material combinations, ornaments, or well-designed corners, much like a magician who knows where the rabbit is kept inside the hat. For those without this lens, recognizing and experiencing spaces as enchanting may happen only if it was clearly intended.

As designers, we can draw inspiration from a broad array of references, from cinema, literature or biology, from consumer culture or high art, from the sacred to the mundane, and strive to infuse a touch of magic into everyday environments. When people experience less daily stress, they’re more open to accommodate and attune to the moods of others. Similarly, spaces that thoughtfully address our basic needs and daily habits make us more receptive to their inherent mood. Frederick Kiesler’s project of the Endless House embodied such intentions for a daily dose of enchantment, seeking an architecture that could “shelter those ‘continuous mutations’ of life-force, which seem to be part of the ‘practical’ as well as of the magical”². He described daily life in his Endless House as follows:

Every mechanical device must remain an event and constitute the inspiration for a specific ritual. Not even the faucet that brings water into your glass, into the teakettle, through your shower and into the bath - that turn of a handle and then the water flowing forth as from the rock touched by Moses in the desert, that sparkling event, released through the magic invention of man’s mind, must always remain the surprise, the unprecedented, an event of pride and comfort.³

The spatial qualities and architectural features of the House were designed to enhance the daily lives of its inhabitants. Kiesler believed that architecture should reflect the richness of life, rather than conforming to the reduced functionalism that was prevalent in his time⁴. To him, functionalism was merely a standardisation of routine activities. It enabled a foot to walk but not to dance, an eye to see but not to envision, a hand to grasp but not to create5. He imagined an architecture that would engage inhabitants in open and creative ways, challenging even the most fundamental elements of domestic environments, such as floors, walls, ceilings, circulation, lighting, and temperature.

One of the most enchanting architectural experiences I’ve encountered was on Naoshima, a Japanese island. While visiting the Chichu Museum designed by Tadao Ando, one could feel their course of action drawn out carefully by the architect: Walking down a long ramp, stopping by the bathroom, hanging your coat, leaving your things in a locker, and putting shoes on a shelf and coming into closer contact with the floor. This deliberate progression infused mundane actions with a sense of ceremony that is inherent to Japanese culture, inviting visitors to slow down and prepare, irrespective of their cultural background, age or occupation, to experience the art and architecture with heightened presence and receptivity.

In today's age of religious scepticism, there is much to learn from visionaries like Kiesler and Ando, who viewed every home as a sacred space in its own right and every mundane task as a potential for heightened experience. This issue seeks to explore various perspectives and approaches to enchantment to uncover ways of restoring a sense of wonder in our everyday lives. As architects, how can we help transcend the mundane in the spaces we design? What do we turn to in order to feel more connected to the environments we inhabit?

Our journey into architectural enchantment begins with Joey Lageschaar’s Magic / Tragic, a personal narrative that alternates between poem and prose, where word-images encourages us to look inwards and around our immediate environment, analysing how the character of a room can be constructed through interactions with objects within it (page 06). Then, we travel to Hong Kong with our pen pal Alicja Jurkowska, losing our way in a maze of corridors and stairwells, revealing how an “Architecture of Entrapment” is the flip side of the enchanting consumerism of the contemporary shopping mall (page 10). Navigating the thin line between enchantment and disenchantment, Stefan Gzyl invites us to think about how architecture can imagine alternate endings in the face of violence and expulsion (page 18).  Finally, Nathan Döding takes us through an archive of abandoned buildings throughout Europe in his conversation with Andre Joosse (page 28).

In this issue, we invite you to dive deeper into these enchanting narratives and explore the myriad ways architecture can shape our experiences, from the mundane to the magical. Whether you're drawn to the poetic reflections of Joey Lageschaar, the intricate urban layers of Hong Kong, or the haunting beauty of forgotten spaces, each piece offers a unique lens through which to appreciate the power of design.

So, turn the page and let the stories and ideas transport you away from the daily struggles of our faculty - there's much to discover about how architecture continues to shape our sense of wonder.