Emotion in the City: The Power of the Weak in the Construction of Place

This paper studies emotion in the experience of space to identify the architectural qualities that contribute most to place attachment. The research combines the expertise of architecture, phenomenology, psychology, and neuroscience in order to investigate the process associated with perception and encoding of spatial cues that induce place attachment and enhanced use of public space. The analysis is based in two case studies conducted in everyday public spaces of Hong Kong and Lisbon.