"That’s a really important ambition: Not to build just to build but to consider why you are building something in the first place."

Through intuitive, interactive spaces and communicative objects, London-based Swedish architect Pernilla Ohrstedt exploits the field’s inherent complexity. Her work challenges perceptions, reshapes the present and imagines a beautiful future in which technology helps create a smarter, more agile and compassionate world.

Beyond the words of “architecture” and “design,” how do you describe what you do?

I like to describe what I do as “designing performances”—performances between spaces and people, objects and people, and objects and buildings. I’m always interested in the interaction between things.

Is there an overarching philosophy that guides your work?

There are a number of things that are really important to me. I see architecture as a way of empowering people. It�...