A Journey to Arcadia (AJTA), is a thesis project investigating the participation in nature and the rediscovery of our lost senses.
As Bruno Latour states in ‘Politics of Nature’, we aim not to protect nature but to focus on our participation in it, keeping it untouched is no longer the ultimate goal, and our renewed interest in site-specificity is fast replacing the holistic approaches (Politics of Nature, 2004). This thesis explores the relationship between the natural and the man-made, considering site as a driving force an
d architecture as a tool to express the presence of nature. In principle, fragility and resilience coexist on the same site but opportunity is often missed because it is either left unattended or too vast to be comprehended, and I propose a small site of an ignored river and a large site of mountain with rocky outcrops in Po Toi Island to discuss these. The role of architecture is twofold, serves as an instrument to reveal the ignored landscape and to redefine movements in the wilderness respectively. This thesis technically examines different approaches towards diverse site identities and the goal is to create more adaptable strategies that can be applied in natural counterparts for the future. Alongside the creation, weather and climate are considered as the external factors to augment our senses towards landscape, thus combining the ever-changing scenery with the aesthetic of the man-made. The delivery is carried out through researching about the available strategies and techniques, and it supports the assumption that the experiential quality should be half done by human and half done by nature.
