Industrial Heritage Buildings in Cyprus; Spatial Experience of the Nicosia Municipal Arts Centre

Abstract

This study focuses on the Nicosia Municipal Arts Centre [NiMAC] in Nicosia, one of the prominent historical industrial buildings in Cyprus, which has been re-functionalized as an art centre. The overall goal of this study is to examine and clarify the human experience of the NiMAC building as part of one’s lifeworld. The main argument of the research is that proposing an effective research design for examining how a person distinguishes the components of a re-used building is possible by human responses to architecture rather than focusing on the physical aesthetics of it. Hence, the purpose of the study is to make a multi-sensory analysis to grasp how a person develops an emotional attitude in the re-functioned space which can be the core assessment of the adaptive re-use purposes. In this context, this research basically explores the main research question which is about what spatial experiences the NiMAC building is offering to people after it is re-functioned when space is experienced in a multisensory approach. Methodologically, this research design is basically created by the hybrid use of first-person, existential, and hermeneutic tactics of the phenomenological approach.

Keywords

• adaptive reuse
• Cyprus
• industrial heritage
• Nicosia Municipal Arts Centre
• spatial experience