Questions and Research

February 17, 2026

There's some pressure for this week's assignment as I must revise my question and find three to five helpful sources. Unfortunately, I'm already feeling a bit behind as I only just narrowed down my topic this past week, but I'm hopeful for the overall journey of where this idea will take me. First on the "to do" list was my revised question; already a big step in my slow process. As a reminder, my old question is as follows:

What architectural strategies can be used to push boundaries in the built world when considering the approach of film set design, which purposefully uses the physical environment to enhance a story?

This question was far from what I want out of my capstone. It was beginning to become what I wanted it to be, but there was still a lot of revision that needed to be done. The articles that I was reading for this same assignment were a large inspiration to my edits. As I scrolled through Google Scholar, I kept my iPad close at hand to try to formulate what I really wanted to ask. Simply by reading the abstracts, my mind began to wander.

From one idea sprang another and soon I had a good understanding of the question specifics. I wanted to try to mesh some of the questions I had jotted down, which led my to my current revised one:

If fictional worlds within films and video games are based in architectural realism, how do

architects create a fantastical atmosphere that escapes reality? What attributes can be taken

from this analysis to creatively design architectural buildings that evoke inspiration within

mundane modernity?

I realized I was very interested in how reality and fiction interact and gain inspiration from each other, and what specific architectural attributes fit certain genres of film and storytelling. I also knew that I wanted to apply this to my belief in the "mundane modernity" as I believe we need to find a new way to inspire contemporary architecture. Due to so much information, I did have to make it a two part question, but I'm still very excited to delve deeper into the topic.

Meanwhile, on the research side of things, I found a couple of potential articles from this exercise, which I did end up using in the final four that I chose. A lot of the research that I briefly read were not aligning with my true topic of interest, so it was hard to find articles I could gain some insight from. Most of the ones I chose were often short, but I'm hoping to continue researching beyond them to see what else I can find. Below are all of the articles I have picked out so far:

• Birer, Emel, and Yasemin Erkan, Yazıcı. “An Analysis of the Fantastic Fiction on Conceptual Space.” World Applied Science Journal 5, no. 13 (2011): 1100–1105. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/295125238_An_Analysis_of_the_Fantastic_Fiction_on ConceptualSpace.

• Friedman, Laurie E. Architecture That Inspires Fantasy: Narrative and Design Explorations. M.Arch. thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Architecture, 1987. https://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/73760.

• Gottwald, Dave, and Gregory Turner-Rahman. “The End of Architecture: Theme Parks, Video Games, and the Built Environment in Cinematic Mode.” The International Journal of the Constructed Environment 10, no. 2 (2019): 41–60. https://www.academia.edu/103374734/The_End_of_Architecture_Theme_Parks_Video_Games_ and_the_Built_Environment_in_Cinematic_Mode.

• Rana, Junaid Alam. “An Exploration of Role of Fantasy Literature in Architectural Imaginations.” Journal of Architecture and Built Environment Research 2, no. 2 (2025): 63–71. https://journals.uol.edu.pk/JABER/article/view/4966.