Includes index.

One of the great but often unmentioned causes of both happiness and misery is the quality of our environment: the kinds of walls, chairs, buildings and streets that surround us. And yet a concern for architecture and design is too often described as frivolous, even self-indulgent. This book starts fromt he idea that where we are heavily influences who we can be, and it argues that it is architecture's task to stand as an eloquent remider of our full potential.