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Визуальный язык города: опыт зрительного восприятия «третьего места» (на примере Нижнего Новгорода)
The article is devoted to the study of the pragmatic aspects of visual communication in the modern urban environment. The physical objects of the city are interpreted as a text aimed at transmitting specific information to its residents. The research focuses both on the processes of meaning-making—based on the interaction of various semiotic resources such as colour, imagery, graphic design, texture, and verbal signs—and on the reception and decoding of this mosaic of visually perceived signs by the audience. The visual landscape of the city is saturated with images and symbols that carry particular cultural and value-laden meanings for its inhabitants. Examining the temporal dimension of objects of material culture makes it possible to trace the connection between the past and the present and to highlight elements of a society’s historical memory. The study centres on the visual characteristics of third places, which constitute important components of urban space. The material for analysis includes commercial recreational venues in Nizhny Novgorod — specifically cafés, coffee shops, restaurants, and pizzerias. Drawing on the principles of social semiotics, the research provides a detailed examination of two case studies: the exterior design of the restaurant ‘Gus v yablokakh’ and ‘Clara Zetkin’, an Asian cuisine café. The purpose of the study is to explore how the visual design of urban spaces communicates messages to city dwellers and to analyze how the cultural meanings embedded in semiotically complex texts are interpreted by their recipients. The study adopts an interdisciplinary approach situated at the intersection of visual communication, media urbanistics, and social semiotics. The key research methods include critical discourse analysis, visual observation, and surveying. Their combined application made it possible to describe the external design of third places as a combination of verbal and nonverbal signs that construct the local identity of the space and to reveal how this visually transmitted information is perceived by audiences. The study identified the influence of both the contemporary urban context and the historical background on the visual perception of third places and specified the factors that make recreational venues noticeable and appealing. The proposed conceptual framework may serve as a basis for a broader analysis of visual communication within the urban context.