Authenticity

We have all heard the term, authenticity. It has become a buzz word in the industry, used to convey just about every new idea and project. Its meaning, like “lifestyle” can be illusive, ambiguous and misconstrued. On the other hand it can also be too narrowly characterized to mean historic, or a long established district. What we’ve found world-wide, however, is that beyond the confusion, authenticity of place is more then ever, critically important.

Today you can shop in you’re living room 24/7, work on-line from any location and explore the splendors of the world without leaving your home. It is creating a profound shift in the reason why people travel, where they go and what they do. At its core this transformation has profoundly changed peoples expectation of place. Today, people promptly distinguish real from fake and genuine from generic. We now know, more than ever, that people seek real places, real connections and real experiences.

We believe that authenticity is less about historic places and more about creating a “truth of experience” that connects people to time, place and a collective memory. In a sense authenticity is the opposite of generic. At its core, authenticity provides people with a unique and original experience that connects them to the identity of place.  Architecture contributes to this experience, but more importantly, an authentic place needs to include every aspect of experience: sound, smell, feel, sight, taste, its culture and heritage, its context and its content. These sensibilities contribute by defining place as a meaningful one-of-a-kind experience, or in other words – authentic.

People expect more from the places they live, work and visit. To deliver this, place must first connect to the heart and mind. It must provide immediate imagery of place, exude local culture and trigger a collective memory. Today, these are the kind of places people will travel to from around the world.

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