Spiritual Architecture

By Cray Shellenbarger

What makes architecture spiritual? Human civilization has always been drawn to some kind of spirituality. This longing to explain “the nature of things” and has manifested itself in buildings and spaces throughout time. My thesis explores what makes theses spaces “spiritual”. It argues that there is no entity that makes a particular piece of architecture spiritual. In fact, the architect or designer is the one whom controls the space. Whether it is intentional or not, the spirituality should be attributed to the person or persons that laid out the space.


Some faiths consider their places of worship sacred, while others do not. The thesis aims to understand which architectural elements influence how churches, synagogue, mosques, etc, are interpreted by occupants. Light, layout and proportion all have a strong influence on how an individual interprets space. It is unnecessary for architects to say that a space feels a certain way because it is blessed or holy. That’s not to say that it is not blessed or holy, but the architect or designer can control how the space is interpreted. As the thesis explores “spiritual” feeling spaces that are not religious this will become clear. It also explores how an individual outside a faith can interpret any space as spiritual or not.

Spiritual spaces that are not directly connected to a religion are analyzed as well. Most people have been to a natural space that felt “spiritual” or peaceful. This cannot be attributed to architects but elements of these spaces could be utilized by them in future design works. It is clear that any religious person will give credit to their specific deity the credit of the natural, spiritual space. However, this work argues that the feeling is because of many other factors that may or may not be in any one designer’s control.

The work also explores the cultural influence on a person in interpretation of space. For example, if a man has no knowledge of a certain faith may still have a spiritual experience in their place of worship or may not. The thesis will explore how much our cultural knowledge influences our experience of a space.