Unity of Sentiment and Scene

Through the cases of 1) outdoor pavilions, study halls and Confucian Academies and 2) Changdeokgung Palace and Rear Garden in Korea, this study maintains that from early on Koreans developed a philosophy of architecture as one with nature, and ultimately one with human beings. Under the Confucian system of thought, architecture formed in this way represents the unity of “sentiment” and “scene.” The unity of sentiment and scene represents movement beyond the state of projecting the individual world view on the object to reach the state of expressing the world view sought by the individual in the projected object. This association of architecture with human virtue leads to the state of unity of heaven and humankind, where the subject and object are one. This is the highest state, which enables architecture and nature to achieve harmony and coexist.