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Through the Liminal
01




I’ve been walking for a while now. Walking and lingering. The road stretches on, just like my thoughts. I took the train to regroup. Will I ever reach where I’m going? I’m going in the passageway, and turn on the left. My route gets dark, then there’s light, then dark again. I smell rain coming. I’m grabbing the first exit I can find, but I’m somehow stuck in a loop. I walk as closely as I can to the wall on my right. The rough surface rubs onto my body, scratching my skin, but I keep walking. I have a sense that this hallway I’m at is alive, observing me. As if it expects from me to make a choice I’m not ready to make.

That’s it, I’m here. What could there be at the end of this route?

Transitional spaces, in other words, liminal spaces or thresholds, are physical or metaphorical representations of the stage ‘in between’ two other distinct stages. Hallways, waiting rooms, passageways, empty parking lots, or areas of transport like airports or train stations, all fall into this category. When entering a threshold, the person is neither here, or there, in a place that is rather unrecognizable, but yet intimately known. Balancing between the existent and the non-existent, the real and the surreal, the physical and the mental, liminal spaces are challenging both the notions of space and time within the context of a narrative.



The relation to time

‘The heterotopia begins to function at full capacity when men arrive at a sort of abso- lute break with their traditional time.’ (Foucault, 1984)

A liminal space prepares and introduces a story – and can powerfully emerge within the ‘cracks’ of traditional notions. This state of being can be rather unsettling and disorienting, but is pivotal in order to complete one’s transition.

Benjamin Whorf distinguishes two types of spatial and temporal realities, one inextricable to the other; the manifested (objective) and manifesting (subjective).

‘It (manifested reality) includes all that is or has been accessible to the senses, the present as well as the past, but it excludes everything that we call the future. Manifesting or subjective reality is the future and the mental. It lies in the realm of expectancy and of desire.’ (Yi-Fu Tuan, 1977) Within this framework, liminal spaces can exist between the manifested and the manifesting realities, amplifying the tension between the objective and the subjective realms. Time becomes fluid, and the visitor navigates between the tangible reality and the mental landscape of possibility. That’s where the narrative is about to unfold: when one is about to confront change, explore new identities, and ultimately reshape their journey.
(cont’d )



The relation to space

Why is the notion of liminal so unsettlingly familiar? Maybe because it resonates with a feeling that most people recognize: being out of place.

In architecture, sometimes these types of spaces are merely zones of transition within a built environment. They connect one distinct space to the other, and facilitate movement. Often overlooked, considered to be serving exclusively functionality, they come across as distant, neglected, cold and indifferent. But instead of still moments in time, these areas could use their simplicity in order to become a breeding ground for change. Instead of existing outside life rhythms, they could facilitate discourse acknowledging their unique role as places of transition. Creating an interplay between lights, shadows, materials, entering ways and exit doors, the experience within the liminal can be heightened. If the transitional space becomes the main setting, it can create a unique narrative atmosphere, emphasizing themes of uncertainty and transformation. This focus allows for deeper exploration of characters’ inner conflicts and their relationships with the environment, blurring the lines between reality and perception.

Liminal spaces hold a certain power onto them. Whether they’re physical or emotional, they are territories of uncertainty and reflection. Through their discomfort, they push the boundaries between space and time, and can be a valuable tool in order to amplify the embodied experience. In these liminal moments one can come to understand the deeper connections between place, time and itself, and face all the inevitable transitions that all these notions come with. Liminality forces introspection, compelling us to confront the unknown before emerging on the other side with a new sense of self or purpose.

And just like that, the hallway behind me dissolves. As if it was never there – or has it always been there?



BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bachelard, G., 1969. The Poetics Of Space. Boston: Beacon Press.

Benjamin, W., 1972. A Short History of Photography. Screen, 13(1), pp.5-26.

Berger, J., 1977. Ways Of Seeing. London: British Broadcasting Corporation.

Foucault, M. “Of Other Spaces, Heterotopias.” Architecture, Mouvement, Continuité 5 (1984).

Tuan, Y., 2018. Space and place: The perspective of experience. Minneapolis, Minn: University of Minnesota Press.


Margarita Voyatzi


Margarita Voyatzi is an Athens-based architect and spatial designer. She is a distinguished graduate of the University of Thessaly, where she obtained her Master’s degree in Architecture. She also studied architecture in Paris, at ENSA Paris-Est. She holds an MA in Narrative Environments from Central Saint Martins, London. She has previously worked in practices in Amsterdam and Athens for the past four years, specializing in creating unique commercial and retail spaces. She currently works at Urban Soul Project, bringing her expertise to innovative design projects, translating stories into immersive, multisensory design experiences.
Thresholds
02




What constitutes a transitional space within the architectural framework?

How do such spaces, often devoid of explicit programmatic function, contribute to the experience and understanding of the built environment?

Can we conceive of an architecture composed solely of transitions, a fluid continuum of in-between spaces?

How do these spaces contribute to the social value of architecture?
Do they hold the key to understanding the deepest desires and anxieties of a society?

Can we decipher the social coherence of a civilization by
examining the thresholds and passages it creates in its architecture?

Can the design of thresholds shape not only our movement through space, but also the evolution of our social structures?





What is a transitional space?

How do these often-functionless spaces shape our very experience of architecture?

Do they dare to redefine boundaries?

Can we create an architecture of pure transition,
a liminal symphony of in-between?

Do these spaces defy typology, resisting categorization?

How do they imbue architecture with social value,
fostering interaction and exchange?

Do these spaces transcend the ephemeral whims of style, echoing through time and revealing the enduring essence of human habitation?




This publication, "Thresholds," explores these questions  through the lens of "Books of Copies," a project initiated by the architectural collective San Rocco.  We have created a digital artifact titled "Thresholds," presented in the distinctive layout of these books.  Books of copies contain images intend to inspire the creation of architecture. Books of copies embrace a diversity of architectural expression, excluding only natural forms. The act of copying here is one of selection and reinterpretation, guided by an appreciation for the inherent beauty of existing forms.







P4architecture


P4architecture, is an internationally awarded architecture firm founded in 2014 in Greece, with studios in Athens, Messenia, and Rhodes. They are a research-driven design studio, uniting architects, engineers, and designers who collectively share a set of core values and principles. 

Alkiviadis Pyliotis is an Architect-engineer and co-founder of the Architecture studio P4architecture. He studied architecture at the Harvard Graduate School of Design and the National Technical University of Athens, where he graduated with honors. He teaches Architectural Design as an adjunct Professor at the Department of Architecture of the University of Patras. 
Konstantinos Pyliotis is an architect-engineer and co-founder of the architecture studio P4architecture. He studied architecture at the Architecture School of the National Technical University of Athens. He continued his academic research in the post-graduate master’s program at N.T.U.A School of Architecture, where he graduated with honors. 
Evangelos Fokialis is an architect-engineer and co-founder of the architecture studio P4architecture. He studied architecture at Harvard Graduate School of Design and the National Technical University of Athens.
Transition As A Medium
03





This is a romantic idea. A romantic approach to transitions, weaving together notions of memory, inhabitation, and spatiality.

To pair with the images, we share here some notes and ideas within and without transitions.




—introductory note— 

In architecture, transitions are not merely utilitarian or programmatic elements; they are profound mediators of spatial and human experience. These spaces are not neutral: they influence social relationships, acting as filters that regulate movement, visibility, and intimacy.

Henri Lefebvre suggests that spaces of transition become arenas where everyday life and social control intersect, charged with cultural and political significance. Robin Evans explores how the architectural arrangement of transitions can either isolate or connect, creating social hierarchies or fostering communal fluidity. Walter Benjamin, in his reflections on arcades, sees transitions—passages—as cultural artifacts, liminal spaces where the flâneur navigates modernity.
Gaston Bachelard, in his phenomenological approach, finds in thresholds poetic and psychological weight, where crossing a door becomes an act of transformation.

Whether it’s the intimacy of a threshold, the anonymity of a corridor, or the spectacle of an arcade, transitions are where architecture becomes experience. Designing these spaces thoughtfully means understanding that every passage is a narrative, every door a decision, and every threshold a moment of becoming.

Today, we believe the modern definition of transitional spaces needs to be extended beyond its inaugural description. We could even dare to imagine that every space is potentially transitional. Simply because of our relationship with cyberspace and digital speed, physical spaces -and objects- have become a transition from which we relate to others. There is no such thing anymore as a space in which we are not intertwined with another one, a space that is not malleable and everchanging (in both form and experience). From encrypted information exchanges to biological cycles, transition is the medium we inhabit.
—transition—

Even within our practice as designers and twin sisters, every day is a transition. We never see or experience the same thing twice. From the construction to the completion of a project, what we leave after a day’s work is never the same thing that welcomes us the next morning. What we imagine is rarely exactly what takes form in the tangible world. What we draw is a translation of what we envision; what we communicate is a transition from thought to conclusion or from premises to new questions; and what we inhabit is a transition destined for ever-changing outcomes—light, use, furniture, activity, sound, smell, transformation.

In the words of Michel Serres, things have a very soft threshold between the nameable and unnameable, the figurable and the un-figurable, the identifiable and unidentifiable. As images fade in our memory, colliding with other ideas, pictures, spaces, and sensations, they merge into blurry definitions of the transitions we inhabit and those we design. We trace lines on paper and within our built environments, sketching thresholds where architecture meets experience, and experience meets meaning.




—representation—

 We blurred photos of all the homes we have lived in, separately. They haven’t really shaped urban change at a large scale, but they have altered our perception of the urban as global, urban as personal, urban as transitional.

We two have only been roommates once, neighbors once, and have lived across cities and countries for years. However, we have shared spaces of childhood, work, study, and imagination. We made a personal map—a mind map, a memory plan. Without urban grids or avenues, we pinned our residences through blurry images, visualizing transitions not just as movements through space, but as passages through time.

The idea of these images seems to have blurred after an elongated passage of time, turning into a serial diminution from touch to sight to thought. They explore the subject-object relation to things, to the urban, to cities, and to the medium of meaning and imagery related to them. They represent a premonitory idea of how, based on our experience of inhabiting all these spaces, definitions of boundaries and transitions have been conceived at various scales: public and private, intimate or common, inside or outside. In attempting to erase these dichotomic poles, the very definitions of such transitions have permeated our practice; from physical borders to the passage of time.

...





estudio estudio


estudio estudio is an architecture, design and research studio, based in Mexico City and founded by Inés Benítez and Nuria Benítez in 2020. Both architecture graduates from UNAM, Inés with a master’s degree from the Harvard Graduate School of Design in Boston and Nuria in the Royal College of Art in London.
Drawing from both research and collaboration as vehicles for design, various forms of creativity allow us to tailor solutions, specific to a physical, cultural, and functional context. They use design as a methodology to solve, represent, rethink, reproduce, reiterate and recreate. The scale of their work is ‘small’, touching upon larger-scale urban and cultural phenomena. They study the intersection between architecture and its narratives within and outside the discipline, bringing together layers that would normally go unnoticed to create projects with multidisciplinary perspectives and participatory processes. They believe that applied creativity is a tool to highlight a specific value and spread the knowledge embedded in each job, in each profession and in each place, as an act of conservation.

Born and raised in Mexico City, they studied Architecture at UNAM
(National Autonomous University of Mexico), graduating with
highest honors.

Inés Benítez
She recently finished her Master in Design Studies in “Art, Design, and The Public Domain” in the Harvard Graduate School of Design, and later completed an “Irving Fellowship” research grant. She has worked as an architect, interior designer, researcher, art producer and exhibition designer. Inés has been Adjunct Professor at Wentworth Institute of Technology and Universidad de los Andes
in Colombia.

Nuria Benítez
She recently studied a Masters in Research at the Royal College
of Art, London, supported by FONCA-CONACYT and Beca Arquitecto Marcelo Zambrano. She has worked at renowned cultural institutions and architecture studios internationally, such as MoMA and Tatiana Bilbao Estudio, as well as started several collaborative practices and experiments. Since 2020, Inés and Nuria founded estudio estudio, a design, architecture and research practice in Mexico City. Since 2021, they are both teaching “Architecture Studio 1” at Universidad Iberoamericana.

LAVA

Ippokratous 9, 10679
Athens, Greece