Architects use transparency to dissolve interior boundaries

Richard Neutra integrated a small reflecting pool beside a mitered glass corner at the 1955 Constance Perkins house in Pasadena to create the illusion that water extends into the living space (Mid-Century Home). This design choice maintains a connection between the compact interior and the steep hillside landscape (Mid-Century Home). At the Manitoga estate in New York, Russel Wright sculpted forest paths and staged views from the house to make the structure feel like an extension of the surrounding woodland (LINEAR Magazine).

Jean-Marie Duthilleul designed the Saint-François de Molitor church in Paris with a translucent facade that evokes a cloud, replacing traditional stained-glass imagery to focus the congregation on the altar. The Augustan Corinthian Order used in the Maison Carée temple in Nîmes employs strict proportions, where column height equals ten times the base diameter, to define the building's exterior scale (Escape Hatch). These methods use specific structural elements to manipulate how occupants perceive the transition between the built environment and the world outside.