ABSTRACT
The link between architecture and place seems more obvious than the one between architecture and point. A natural consequence of Heidegger's fusion between meaning and being is that Norberg-Schulz replaces the abstract, logical entity point with the far more concrete, phenomenological place. In Genius Loci, Norberg-Schulz emphasizes that human identity springs from the 'identity of place'. When forming the architectural environments of the future, it is a multicultural society which will be built. There is a sharp contradiction between 'development of place' based on geographically defined identities as the basis for meaningful architectural environments on the one hand, and an increasingly multicultural and mobile society, on the other. Place or territory seems quite dysfunctional, even dangerous, as an architectural interpretant. Obviously loss of place does not signify the loss of a place such as a loss of for instance a hilltop or a bridgehead in war.
