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example, to the pull of a cupola, and inciting us to ascend,
for example on > staircases and ramps. During each phase
of movement, the resources of dramaturgy produce expres-
sive effects, arouse expectations, hint at mysteries. They may
threaten to engulf us in dark abysses, promise us a celebra-
tory reception in gleaming > light, or awaken sensations of
infinity through endless > sequences. The guiding of move-
ment through structure is supported by a tactile network of
handrails, doorknobs, or other > details, in particular those
involving the treatment of surfaces, differentiations of > col-
our and > materiality. Floorings, for example, may signal ei-
ther continuity or a transition between stages or directions of
movement, either subdividing or unifying.
From the perspective of practical action, movements are
necessary as connections between > places via > routes. Re-
garded as hodological spaces (route spaces), buildings and
cities are first of all interwoven with networks of routes. But
movement plays a role in architecture not solely as forward lo-
comotion; instead, every form of use of a space and the objects
it contains is based on purposeful movement. According to
Paul Frankl (1908) we can perceive the ‘soul’ of architecture in
its active > use, and movement as ‘a bridge leading towards it’.
Beyond practical purposes, a work of architecture pro-
vides multifarious possibilities for movement as the basis for
a rich spatial experience, as in the promenade architecturale,
towards which Le Corbusier strove, and in some cases also
fosters intellectual mobility. As the expressive qualities of built
forms, the dynamic > form character and > gestures of archi-
tecture are often suggestive of actual movement, i.e. when a
bridge curves across a river, or a spatial form appears to have
been rhythmicized. The result is not only a pictorial, but also
a specifically architectural experience, in particular through
the concrete re-enactment of the gesture. Differently than in
a picture, whose rhythms can be grasped adequately in visual
terms, an architectural > rhythm is experienced with spatial
intensity only through one’s own actual rhythmic forward