The essay begins by speaking on the spirit of place. How places need certain characteristics to bring artists and tourists to locations. And why we find these places beautiful or picturesque isn’t really easy to pinpoint. And how modernism has changed our cities and society to only associate places such as natural landmarks or remarkable built forms as beautiful locations.
It also speaks about the sense of place and how that relates to the spirit of a place, how a sense of place comes from numerous things. Sight, smell taste, touch, memories, experiences. And also the geographical environment, the local materials used in the buildings situate the sense of place in the area. And modernism has ruined this, the idea to replace everything old with something new, using cement and steel. Things that you have no idea where they came from can ruin a sense of place. Postmodernity has dismissed this approach and celebrates diversity.
It also speaks on that in a virtual environment one can create anything, any building beyond the limits of real life. Planning permission, neighbours. Population increases are out of the book and the creator becomes like a god in this situation. Also what virtual reality offers is different to other media, paintings are only experienced with sight, and digital media, imagination and sight. And virtual worlds encompass predominantly all of the senses.
It also speaks that virtual reality is definitely real if some people choose it to be. The spaces of real-life can be replicated to the utmost reality. How do we deal with this? What places can we recreate or imagine and design in the world? What should we design and what shouldn’t we?
It touches that virtual reality environments can never be authentic as authentic means to be real and that’s something virtual reality could never be, as well as this it speaks on that what they can be, is accurate reproductions of real places.
Finally, it ends with the thoughts around a sense of place in a virtual environment, how this will come from the participants in the world. The players the millions of people that connect online will create and add a living feeling to these virtual worlds.