Architecture exists as an economy of images.

“It tastes so real!”

In a small room, the sides rendered with a lickable wallpaper, Willy Wonka’s guests are seduced by the 2D fruits of his creation. As they lick, the images of strawberries “taste like strawberries, the bananas taste like bananas”

The production of architecture leans on images to convey a taste of buildings. As the images become more descriptive, the building becomes realer and realer. Curious. For their branding, reputation, and legacy, images are as important to architects as buildings.

But architecture consumes as many images as it produces, and the expansion of digital culture and artificial intelligence is subverting the position of imagery within architectural production. Clickable wallpaper is created, used, and consumed before the building has even been conceptualised.

The following projects question the importance of visual material in the production and consumption of architecture; drawing from a plethora of mediums and a breadth of typologies.

“We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams”