Storytelling [in] Architecture: Approaching Relational Architecture

What is the importance of and meaning of storytelling in architecture? Can an architecture tell its own story? Can the role of narrator be fulfilled by an architecture? Oral histories are passed down, generation by generation, and the words spoken take on new meaning with each retelling. Extrapolating from this idea of original meaning and subsequent change, is it possible to research how architecture narrates a story about growth and change and how reinterpretations occur? Is it possible to accumulate understanding of an architecture in the diverse ways that meaning is achieved through storytelling? By reading, experiencing, and reinterpreting the space and built form? This thesis explores these processes and suggest how architecture naturally privileges the 'reader' as participant by 'hiding' and embedding its experiential, sensorial, and phenomenal qualities. The chosen site for this exploration is Building 22; the school of architecture at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada.