SENSE + AI

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ARCH 4001 studio. Fall 2025

SENSE: Spatial Experiences for Narrative and Sensory Emotions with AI-Assisted Design

Final Presentation: Monday, December 1, 1:30 p.m. – 4 p.m.
CGC Lab, Room 4425, College of DAAP bldg, UC

session A: 1:30-3. Three groups
session B: 304. Two groups

Museum concept by UC student Dwayne CarterEmma CekCourtney Reese. Fall. 2025

student projects in Viverse

please click the link on the right to view the virtual world in browser

Meghan Powell Stella Shover Ainsley Brown A Virtual Journey into the Meaning of Life
Molly Greene Lilly Wick Sasha Kushner Lower Blue Lake Museum
Franck Toukam Daniel  Dubanovich Jared Mclean Cave Museum 
Dwayne Carter Emma Cek Courtney Reese Museum of Life
Caden Ancona Aaron Landers Lucas Tereck Emerald Lake Museum of Emotion

Studio Overview

This design studio invited students to explore the complex relationship between architecture, human emotion, and experiential design through the conceptualization of a Museum of Emotion. Students investigated how spatial environments could evoke, mediate, and communicate emotional states—moving beyond functionality to create experiences that resonated on psychological, sensory, and cultural levels.

A central component of the studio was the integration of AI-assisted design, enabling students to analyze emotional responses, generate spatial strategies, and rapidly prototype conceptual ideas. Generative AI, emotion-mapping, and behavior-simulation tools supported students in augmenting human intuition with computational insight. The studio also incorporated Extended Reality (XR) and metaverse-based design workflows. Using VR and immersive visualization tools, students built immersive prototypes, tested multisensory spatial effects, and evaluated human perception within full-scale virtual environments. Metaverse platforms supported collaborative world-building, experiential storytelling, and the creation of interactive narrative spaces that extended beyond traditional architectural representation.

By combining neuroscience, art, culture, AI-driven methods, XR technologies, and metaverse design practices, students developed speculative proposals for a museum that functioned not only as a cultural institution but also as a space of introspection, empathy, and transformation.

Studio Objectives

  • Understand and interpret the spatial, sensory, and material qualities that influence human emotional responses.
  • Translate research on emotion into architectural language (form, light, material, scale, sequence, etc.).
  • Design immersive environments that express or evoke specific emotional states.
  • Engage interdisciplinary methods (AI, Extended Reality, Metaverse) to inform spatial experience.
  • Critically assess cultural, ethical, and therapeutic dimensions of designing for emotion.

Key Questions

  • How can architectural elements—light, space, materiality, proportion—evoke emotional responses?
  • What is the role of immersive and interactive technology (VR/AR, AI, biometric feedback) in shaping emotional experiences?
  • How do cultural, personal, and neurophysiological factors affect emotional perception of space?
  • How can architecture foster emotional literacy, empathy, and collective memory?

Museum concept by UC student Meghan Powell Stella Shover Ainsley Brown. Fall. 2025

Program

Each student (or team) will design a Museum of Emotion on a site of their choice. The museum must include:

  1. Core Zones (Required):
  • Emotion Lab: Interactive gallery presenting scientific and technological perspectives on emotion.
  • Rooms of Emotion: A minimum of three immersive emotional environments (e.g., joy, fear, sadness, awe, love, anger).
  • Memory Archive: A participatory or data-driven installation space where emotional memories are recorded, interpreted, and displayed.
  • Cultural Expressions Gallery: A rotating exhibition space focused on how different cultures represent and process emotions.
  1. Optional Programs (Student-Defined):
  • Workshop or educational spaces
  • Performance or therapeutic spaces
  • Café or gathering zone
  • Outdoor sensory garden or emotional path

Design Tools and Methods

  • Precedent studies of museums, memorials, and immersive installations
  • Digital modeling and rendering (with emphasis on atmosphere and mood)
  • Use of AI-assisted simulations, AIGC, and VR walkthroughs
  • Assessment through user feedback survey

 

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