Abstract: Metaphor involves two mechanisms, i.e. production mechanism and understanding mechanism, and yet traditional theories of metaphor failed to provide a uniform theoretical framework to address both of them. Based on the distinction in the philosophy of mind between physical and phenomenal properties of sensory experience, this paper advances the phenomenal account of metaphor, arguing that the production and understanding of metaphor depends primarily on speaker’s and hearer’s similarity cognition of the phenomenal properties of both the tenor and the vehicle. It is further argued that the phenomenal properties projected from the tenor to the vehicle are more often than not those salient and stereotypical in a certain context, which helps to avoid radical relativism.