He first apprenticed as a mason and then studied architecture at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts from 1916 to 1918.

He was part of the Danish Urban Planning Laboratory from 1924, as the Academy Council's representative, and its leader from 1942 to 1948.

One of Rasmussen's most influential books was Experiencing Architecture, first published in Danish in 1957 and in English in 1959.

Underlining the importance of a first-person, embodied experience of architecture - including its shape, color, scale, proportion, rhythm, textural effects, daylight and sound - the book may be regarded as a classic in architectural phenomenology.

[citation needed] On 15 June 1934 he married Karen Margrethe Schrøder (12 November 1904 - 31 March 1985), daughter of economist and later Danish National Bank manager Frederik Carl Gram Schrøder og Astrid Koefoed.