Date of Award
Spring 5-22-2026
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Design (MDes) in Interior Studies / Exhibition + Narrative Environments
Department
Interior Architecture
First Advisor
Jeffrey Katz
Second Advisor
Francesca Liuni
Third Advisor
Can Altay
Abstract
I began this project from a recurring perception: that simple, everyday elements carry distinct and often unexpected qualities. For me, the number six is green and tastes like grapes; the number two feels deep blue. Even bottled water from different brands seems to possess specific forms of character, some sharp, some rounded, some soft like cotton. I first encountered the word synesthesia in elementary school writing classes, where it was introduced as a literary device frequently used in classical poetry and prose. For instance, a gentle rain might be described as “soft as pastry,” translating a visual phenomenon into tactile and gustatory texture.
Rather than treating these associations as subjective anomalies, this thesis considers them as a potential framework for spatial design. This thesis presents an olfactory-driven hospitality project titled AER, derived from the Greek aēr, meaning air as a moving, perceptible medium. Integrating lodging, dining, and aromatherapeutic experiences, the project proposes a unified atmospheric system. While interior architecture has traditionally privileged visual and material conditions, scent remains underdeveloped as a design medium. This thesis investigates how olfaction can organize spatial sequencing and emotional modulation.
This thesis proposes an alternative framework in which fragrance operates as a mediating system, translating olfactory parameters into light, temperature, material tactility, movement, and emotional perception. A pear-led composition (Pear / Fir and Cassia Seed / Benzoin) can be translated into spatial shifts: brightness and speed at the volatile top note, corresponds to a sunlit threshold with reflective materials such as glass and brass, a faster circulation tempo, and a horizontal airflow that carries scent across the body like passing wind during a morning drive; as the composition shifts into fir and cassia seed, the environment moves toward greater depth and steadier diffusions; and enclosed, absorptive warmth in the resinous base.
The project unfolds as a multi-program environment where guest rooms, dining areas, and therapeutic zones are connected through scent transitions. Olfactory zoning, material absorption studies, ventilation choreography, and iterative fragrance formulation establish cross-sensory correspondences between smell and spatial experience. Aromatherapy is embedded within the architectural structure, redefining space as a continuous perceptual field.
In this context, hospitality functions not as the final objective, but as a spatial framework through which a broader question is investigated: how can an invisible medium organize space?
Through prototyping across material and environmental scales, this thesis argues that synesthetic mapping can serve as a design methodology. By repositioning fragrance from decorative enhancement to structural construct, it expands the discourse of interior architecture toward a cross-sensory understanding of space, where scent is not applied to space, but generates its form, organization, and experience.
Recommended Citation
Cai, Qiyi, "AER" (2026). Masters Theses. 1595.
https://digitalcommons.risd.edu/masterstheses/1595
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