MEDIA FAÇADES AND THE IMMERSIVE ENVIRONMENTS. Connections and Interactions Between the Real and Virtual World to Create Immersive Environments

Since the 1980’s, there has been a massive use of electronic and informa- tion technology for the development and management of the architectural envelope. This new design approach has produced an ambiguous use of the word “medium” when referring to architecture. Many scientists, planners, architects and philosophers (Virilio, Tschumi, Venturi, Foucault, Flusser, etc.) have described the birth of a new function for architecture; today, architecture has become a support of print and electronic media. It be- gins to take on a more recognized communicative function and commercial use; this tends to be most apparent in major metropolitan areas. This new communicative function increases the commercial value of the buildings — sometimes at the expense of functionality. This evolution has produced a new design trend: contemporary architecture becoming a place of ex- perimentation and application of advanced technologies encouraging the evolution, and sometimes the abuse, of the meaning of media-architecture.