Proactive Sensory Urban Design

Nowadays we see a growing interest in how urban design and planning practices can bring in the sensory dimension of the built environment to contribute to the creation of more sustainable and healthy cities. However, as the literature shows, there is little applied research in practices that can be referred to as examples of (multi)sensory urbanism as well as tools and techniques that can be leveraged by professionals. Against this backdrop, this article aims to contribute to this line of inquiry by providing guidelines / a toolkit for designing public spaces with sound and smell, grounding on the analysis of best practices where sound and smell are treated not as pollutants but as resources for creating quality urban environments. These selected projects are taking an appreciative approach providing either innovative solutions or temporary experiences to create new urban values through senses. By analysing the best practices, we ultimately aim to follow a change in perspective, moving from a reactive design approach (to abate the pollutants) to proactively promoting the quality of the sonic and smell environments.