Embodied Philosophy
Meditations on Corporate Architecture
“Architecture is inhabited sculpture.”
— Constantin Brancusi
Sculptor (1876 – 1957)
“Music is liquid architecture. Architecture is Frozen Music.”
— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
“A great architect is not made by way of the brain nearly so much as
he is made by way of a cultivated, enriched heart.”
— Frank Lloyd Wright
“Architecture is embodied philosophy. The way a business solves the architectural
problem reveals much about how they view employees and clients.”
— J. R. St John
The soft edges, the rounded shapes, the art, the blended colorations, the bright accents, the sculpture, the music. It’s emblematic of a point of view. It reveals a perspective. It manifests a culture… It is “Philosophy,” given Form.
We travel, because we wish, by seeing different things and places, to feel differently! To see differently. Perhaps to be different! Because a given place can influence the way we see, feel, and experience life.
I still feel constricted when I remember that concrete block building where I attended elementary school… It left a scar, and much of it an authoritarian, tight, constrained, rule-bound scar that is still, slowly healing. I’ll never think of anything else when seeing architecture like that.
Travel and variety expand our awareness of what is possible, what already exists, what’s previously been done, and what kinds of possibilities are waiting to be brought to life.
There’s a connection between certain kinds of thinking and experience and the places in which those experiences occur… Change the location, change the architecture; and the feeling almost has to change with it.
You may never forget that special “Kiss on the Bridge…” 
(You had a “kiss on the bridge didn’t you???) Some bridges are more conducive to kissing are they not? (There are few tender moments for romance on the GW…) But that bridge in Venice — priceless. And bridges in general may be forever inflected with that feeling. And that’s all right.
So what do people “feel and perceive about “Business?” About Your Business? Are they correct or accurate in their perceptions? Are you attempting to deliberately influence their perceptions? If not; Why not?
When they come to work at your place for the first time, they are not a blank slate… They’ve already had years to accumulate perspectives, judgements, feelings and opinions about business, bosses and work.
Perhaps the way you engineer the surroundings can become a positive influence (even if not consciously noticed…) to move them toward a more positive reality — to let them see this business, this place, these people, this work, in a new (and more expansive) light, in a new moment of time.
Your architecture is an embodied philosophy! Just what gets embodied, is a choice, and to some degree, it’s up to you! Make the most of your opportunity, and give your culture and your philosophy a voice.
Applications
1. For You
Not all of us are afforded the opportunity to influence the corporate architecture which surrounds us. But no matter what the scale, you do have some degree of influence. Do you hang your coat? On what? That is a choice… How about the wall in your cube, then the lighting, the alerts, fonts, screens and brightness on your computer? It’s all within your reach even as a young player. As you mature and move up, you gain influence and a broader array of choices.
2. For the Family
First you decorate, then you build. It’s a natural process, of starting with what you control. The things you buy, the way you apportion space, the way you decorate, the colors, texture and use of light: all within your control, even in that first apartment or home. As time passes, we sometimes fail to notice our larger span of control, having been lulled into somnambulance by the ever present/unchanging aspects of our home, furniture, neighborhood and income-based sense of stature… But as you send your children off to college, help them discover their own freedom to both choose and control aspects of their environment — to their advantage.
3. At Work
Acquiring a building may not be a privilege afforded everyone. But consider it for a moment… What would you do, faced with the pleasure (or the pain) of having acquired a grey space building and 20,000 square feet?
How much light? How many kinds of interference from the Building Code Guys? How much space do you apportion for each person? How many people do you anticipate? What are you trying to say? Is this a hive? A profit generator? A low cost, outlying boiler room? Or a laboratory for growing smarter, greater people and big ideas? Would the place change; depending? Shouldn’t it?
Architecture: something to be seen, experienced, appreciated and influenced — to the degree your personal or executive resources allow. But don’t despair if you can’t acquire a fixer upper in Piccadilly or that 40 story mid-century modern on Wilshire. It’s everywhere, and it’s subject to your philosophical fingerprint!
Give substance to your beliefs, and enjoy!
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