ARCHITECTS HAVE BEEN talking for years about “biophilic” design,
“evidence based” design, design informed by the work of
psychologists. But last May, at the profession’s annual
convention, John Zeisel and fellow panelists were trying to
explain neuroscience to a packed ballroom. The late-afternoon
session pushed well past the end of the day; questions just kept
coming. It was a scene, Zeisel marveled—all this interest in
neuroscience—that would not have taken place just a few years
earlier. Zeisel is a sociologist and architect who has
researched the design of facilities for Alzheimer’s patients.
Architects, he explains, “understand about aesthetics; they know
about psychology. The next depth to which they can go is
understanding the brain and how it works and why do people feel
more comfortable in one space than another?” This is an
admittedly abstract concept. To help explain, architects often
tell this story: Early in his career, when he was still
struggling to find a cure for polio, Jonas Salk retreated t