ABSTRACT
Atmosphere is essentially ambiguous, always mediating between seemingly opposite notions, such as subject-object, individual-collective, naivety-expertise, here-there, parts-whole. An atmospheric approach to site analysis requires first and foremost, an open, receptive mind-set in the researcher. The experience of atmosphere is tied to the immediate: it "happens" the moment that one is present in a place, it is the encounter between the place and one's being at a specific moment. The aim of this contribution has been to provide appropriate methods to understand urban and architectural atmospheres. When describing atmospheres in metaphoric language, the specificity of place can be evoked by means of a comparison: expressing its similarity or difference compared to another place. Indeed, if atmosphere is a threshold, a matter of both the physical and mindful, subject and object, naivety and expertise, it is through such writing, that is the bringing together of seemingly contradicting notions, that it may be captured and become communicable.
