part a journal

design studio air semester 1.15

ANNIE TANG

DESIGN STUDIO// AIR

SEMESTER ONE 2015STUDIO 15 : 18.15-21.15 THURSDAY

ANNIE TANG 541381

TUTOR: SONYA PARTON

Contents

PART A// CONCEPTUALISATION

PART B// CRITERIA DESIGN

PART C//DETAILED DESIGN

design futuring 10a.1 design computation 17a.2 composition/generation 21a.3 conclusion 24a.4 learning outcomes 24a.5 algorithmix sketches 26

introduction 6

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ABOUT ANNIEI have grown up in Melbourne my whole life, currently in my final year of study as an architecture student. I fell in love with the idea of architecture and creating spaces when i was much younger, con-stantly drawing up plans for imaginary houses for my future self. Before universi-ty, I only thought of architecture as points of interest of where I would travel too. Throughout this course I have learnt that the built world are not simply clusters of styles, heights, materials in a linerar timeline but rather a coordinated system of knowledge, rules, and procedures that is shared by people who participate in the building culture.

Virtual Environments in first year came as a shock with the advanced technological software and the unconventional designs that would be created by the students. It encouraged me to open up to the differ-ent possibilites of design with Rhinoceros and intrigued me how the designs could be fabricated. Although my experience with Rhino is still at a beginner stage, I’m excited at taking this skill set further this

semsester in Studio Air with the use of grasshopper to facilitate new possibilities.

Aside from architecture I like to keep myself busy doing a vast array of activites. I am also undertaking a minor in Global wine studies and make coffee and paint murals for a living.

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A PART

CONCEPTUALISATION

“conceptualization begins to determine WHAT is to be buildt...and HOW it will be built...”

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design futuring

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In this milenium, architectural discourse has shifted significantly from designing on a small scale focus, that is for the inhabitants, community and its culture to the broader focus of design futuring; designing for the longevity of our earth in the midst of this condition of unsustainability that has been an inevitable course as a result of human habitation, amplified by the kinds of technologies we have created and the imbalance of our sheer numbers for this hierarchical artificial world we have fashioned.

Tony Fry, a design theorist and philosopher in his book Design Futuring: Sustainability, ethics and new practiceconfronts the truth of the matter, that ‘for all thecelebration of human intelligence, the culture of western rationalism that came into global dominance totally failed to comprehend and respond to the innate and subsequently amplified propensity of human centeredness toward being unsustainable’1 and yet in this moment of criticality, ‘a moment in which damage to the planetsclimatic and ecological systems is still increasing andexposing life as we know it to growing dangers, our species’ auto-destructive mode of being is neither fundamentally recognized nor redirectively engaged’. We have become so familiarized and desensitized to the ’status quo’ of the world we live in that it will jeopardize our future generations. This brings to the forefront the issue that as a civilization, an inception of a different kind of sustainable future argues to be considered and recognized.

We as the current and future designers of our global landscape need to not only recognize these issues of changing a global mindset but to incorporate these ideologies into the core of our designs.

To design with greater synthesis of diverse requirements, a shift of current conventional methodologies that school our current architecture discourse needs to be rediscovered to incorporate the real life complexities of environmental issues. This issue is greater than the architects of our millenium can realitistically resolve, is it one that urges the need to incorporate an immense array of related industries and government bodies.

1. Tony Fry, Design Futuring: Sustainability, Ethics and New Practice ( Oxford: Berg, 2009), p2.

With environmental initiatives becoming more prevalent and more publicized each day, the importance of thismatter lies upon each individual to grasp what knowledge and technology they can and project that into society.

In the field of Architecture, the relatively new digital architectural design has developed some of the most vibrant and influential areas in contemporary architectural discourse and practice. Technologies enabled by computing trigger a comprehensive re-consideration of established design workflows leading to new opportunities, creating new challenges and requiring new competencies. This era of digitalization in Architecture allows for resolves that were not available in the pre-digital era. Using a computational approach not only allows for the designer to evaluate thousands of possibilities to the design but also to maximise potentials in the way it is built & incorporate sustainble technologies in an efficient way.

Richard Williams in his book Architecture & Visual culture states that architecture frames our lives and defines our movement through cities and it is of huge socialimportance.2 Architecture is not solely just a sum of its materials but of a larger building culture- the coordinated system of knowledge, rules, and procedures that is shared by people who participate in the building activity and that ultimately determines the form buildings and cities take.3

Viewing it by not only its apprearance but as an urban and social experience invites the communative dialogue between humans, the built form and our earth.

Ultimately, any built form is more than its components; it embraces the attempt to solve ideas and questions about location, climate, politics, social norms, economy,spirituality and emotion. Computational architecture is just another means to resolve the current situation and open discussion for the future of design.

This journal serves to act as my personal narrative of the introduction and exploration of such digital technologies and the integration of these new design processes into architectural discourse.

2. Richard Williams, ‘Architecture and Visual Culture’ in exploring Vi-sual Culture: Definitions, Concepts, Contexts (Edinburgh: Edinburgh

University Press. 2005) 3. Howard Davis, The Culture of Building (USA: Oxford University Press, 2000), p3

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PRECEDENT

THE 5 PILLARS OF BAWADIBIG architectsbawadi, dubai, ae

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The 5 Pillars of Bawadi by BIG was a competition entry that aims to buildsustainably in the desert to protect the building and the urban spaces around it from the desert sun.

The design is 190000M2 in size, with outwardly leaning facades at the inclination of the average sun angle to dodge the sun rays and rest in the shade of the building itself. The resultant building volume is a sort of inverted pyramid with the apex buried deep in the desert sand. By developing varying clusters of small and tall pyramid archways, shaded space is created beneath the canopy of the large floating building mass. Between the trunks of the 5 hotels allows an open air market at an urban scale.

Bjarke Ingels took a conventional block programme and cut away at it to allow for a more dynamic and purposeful structure as a tradition block programme would have recieved heavy exposure on the vertical

facades and leave all the surroundingsurfaces bathed in sun.

This project engages the computational side of architecture and shows the possible advancements in smarter design. Though this is merely an idea and not a built pro-ject, the technologies of creating such a project are available and allow for other designers to take note to unconventional design.

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PRECEDENT

HYGROSKIN-METEORSENSITIVE PAVILIONachim menges architect & oliver krieg & steffen reichertorleans-la-source, france, 2013

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The Hygroskin Meteorosensitive pavillion was chosen as the second precedent due to its use of one material; plywood. This project employs similar design strategies of biological systems in which the responsive capacity is quite literally ingrained in the material. Meteorosensitive Architecture physicially programmed a responsive mate-rial system that requires neither extraneous mechanical or electronic controls, nor the supply of external energy.

The Pavilion’s envelope is both the load-bearing structure and meterosensitive skin derived computationally from the elastic bending behavious of thin plywood sheets. The response movements are mod-elled after spruce cones as they naturally re-spond to environmental stimuli. When dry, the cone opens up and closes when wetted.

Though this natural response of wood with humidity has been a common understand-ing of those in building culture, Hygroskin is one of the few to exploit it for design intelligence.

Hygroskin expands future possibilites in ar-chitecture as a new means to look at mate-riality and biological systems in a way it has not been considered before.

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A.1 DESIGN COMPUTATION

the benefits of engaging with contemporary computational design techniques...

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design computation

Computing has been an ever-rising trend in archi-tectural design in the last decade with computeri-zation being a prevalent factor in the evolution of design process. Coding in particular is an asset of an architects’ design tools that aids the vision and result by ‘…starting to look now not for some ideal form, like a Latin cross for a church, but actually all the traits of a church: so, light that comes from behind from an invisible source, directionality that focuses you towards an altar…you just need to incorporate a certain number of traits in a very kind of genetic way’ says Greg Lynn, one of the promi-nent architects leaning towards this change in ethos. Figure 1 depicts Tadao Ando’s Church of Light in Osaka that takes a literal metaphor of the cross and uses structure as a compenent for meaning whilst Figure 2 shows Greg Lynn’s Ko-rean Presbyterian Church of New York taking a computational approach to acheive the same affect of light and symbolism.

This system of calculating and determining spac-es by use of mathematical and logical methods is about the ‘exploration of the indeterminate, vague and unclear processes, and because of this explor-atory nature, computation aims at emulating or extending the human intellect’ . Computation alludes to almost unlimited amount of possibilities and geometries, all of which can be coded through a growing number of programs such as Grasshop-per, Kangaroo, Firefly, Weaverbird, GECO and many more.

Not only can unique unseen forms be created through use of the above mentioned programs, it also introduces new way of thinking about the spaces by means of an integrated art form. An interesting example of computation use can be seen in LAVA’s design of the Green Void Installation (figure 3). The design rises 20 meters in height and made of green lycra is derived from nature, realized in lightweight fabric.

The design was derived from nature; the connection of different boundaries in three-dimensional space, found in nature in cells, crystals and soap bubbles. The purpose of this design located at Customs house Sydney was to activate the public space with a focus on featuring contemporary architecture, photography and multimedia exhibitions. This successful integration of the much different func-tionality that the design provides is proof that the exploration of new geometries through compu-tation can create a wide array of possibilities that historical architectural ethos may be more limited.

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A.2 COMPOSITION/GENERATION

the use of generative approaches in the design process

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COMPOSITION/GENERATION

Algorithmic thinking, parametric modelling and scripting culture offer new possibilities andresolutions in the realm of architectural design. In parametric modelling, there is an explicit relationship between parameters and a piece of complex geometry. Daniel Davis claims that parametric modelling is defined by its roots in mathematics and logic causing resolutions to be more algorithmic than artistic or stylistic consideration. Its focus is on the relationship between the explicit functions and independent variables. Despite the control and manipulation over such relationships, parametric modelling is not without its limitations. Architects are overloaded with data input and how design creation takes place is put on the forefront. Secondly, the complexities of such designs can be difficult to understand by just one person, technology is inevitable subject to malfunction and control over changes in the design becomes much more vulnerable.

Though parametric modelling doesn’t allow more freehand sketching, as it is based on simple geometries and logical relationships, this can be seen as an advantage in that the designer can explore hundreds and thousands of iterations that would otherwise be an extremely tedious task and would not be as varied. This experimentation stage is perhaps arguably the most effective outcome of using computer coding in design process as it allows for numerous ideas to be tested or a basic principle to be explored in different directions.

With the addition of 3-D modelling software, these algorithms can be quickly recognized in a virtual platform which allows for more consideration of the final design. Rhino for example allows the user to create objects where you can essentially unfold or break it up into shapes and simple piece together. This is also crucial in the generation of digitalarchitecture as it allows for not only the construction of designs but also for them to be recognized and realized in real-life.

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The Aqua tower (2009) by Studio Gang Architects is located in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It is a multi-use tower that incorporates a hotel, apartments, condominiums, parking, offices, and one of Chicago’s largest green roofs. The wave like iterations on the facade of the building incorporates a development of the idea of community. Each outdoor terrace is differed in shape from each floor depending on specific user’s criteria such as views, solar shading, and dwelling size & type. These forms act to integrate the city and the outdoors as well as forming a distinctive and unique appearance. What i think Studio Gang Architects does well in this regular brief is to take that standard apartment block and use parametric modelling to bring the community together by creating open and green spaces but also using that terrace space to shade. This increase in efficiency connects the stakeholders to nature, brings joy and is an inspiration.

A particularly interesting recent generation of parametric modelling is the Modular Artificial Reef Structure (MARS) 2015 created by Australian designer, Alex Goad. Goad created a system of modular ceramic components for forming structures to form a base for plant and anilmal life to return to habitats destroyed by climage change, pollution and destructive fishing practices. These forms are made of porous ceramic, filled with marine-grade concrete and reinforced with composite bars to add weight. The ceramic surface is intended to mimi the calcium skeletons of dead coral, which build up over thousands of years to create structures that living corals attach themselves onto to gain better access to sunlight and plankton-rich curents.

This design shows the shift from composition to generation. A naturally degrading system in nature that may have naturally taken 100 years to restore is reduced to 8-15 years using the MARS system. This innovative design showcases how this shift affects how well we can solve issues. Parametric modelling and algorithmic thinking in this particular example allows for a variation in different outcomes, easy assembly of systems underwater, low-cost efficiency due to the ability to computerise how the system is pre-fabricated.

Both these examples of parametric modellingdisplay regenerative development. This integration between nature, humans, materials lead to a more posi-tive environment, one in which also points to this shift in paradigm, an ecological worldview.

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A.3&4 CONCLUSION & LEARNING OUTCOMES

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Part A: Conceptualisation, through the exploration of theoretical discussion in digitalarchitecture, it has come to light the importance of how such new methods of design can affect our buildt environment. Though there is no straight answer to how to design for the future, these new technoligies bring extensive knowledge to design intelligence and push the conventional way of designing to another playing field.

Digital Design is multi-faceted realm, after all, a machine is different from a person, hence, they think differently. Most of the projects mentioned in Part A such as Hygroskin, The 5 pillars of Bawadi etc utilise this new way of design to solve their briefs. The resulting projects show the importance of understanding programming languages to truly innovate in the digital world. Going back to basics and investigating how things like wood, a core building material can be efficiently maximised through particular generative design methods to achieve economical and functional outcomes.

The project brief for this studio is quite vague in itself, to design an architectural intervention along Merri Creek that will express the continuous relationships between technical, cultural and natural systems and rectify sites of negative human intervention along Merri Creek to have a better outcome for the natural environment. The only direction, to use biomimicry as an avenue through which to start to grapple with the materialisation of design ethics. To look at a naturally occuring performance to integrate into the architectural

design. I wonder if this is easier said than done? To explore endless systems and possibilites in a limited 10 week timeframe whilst still grasping the software to create a material object seems daunting.

Grasshopper has proved to be an interesting design tool in Rhino, it has a simple format in which there are parameters. I still don’t quite grasp how exactly it does this, the coding it take to produce such a program however it has made me view Rhino in a completely different way. I think if i had known of Grasshopper back when i was studying Virtual Environments, i would have produced a much more interesting looking design.

The theory behind architectural computing proves to be intricate and more complex that i had originally imagined. It is apparant that this new age calls for new designs. My intended design approach at this point is to utilise simple materials found in the vicinities of Merri Creek and expose some complex ecological process in the exterior.

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A.5 ALGORITHMIC SKETCHES

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IMAGESPage 10. Future City DrawingSource: http://joakimolofsson.deviantart.com/art/Futuristic-city-2-317935457

Page 12 &13. BIG The 5 pillars of BawadiSource: http://www.big.dk/#projects-baw

Page 14&15. HygroskinSource: http://www.archdaily.com/424911/hygroskin-meteorosensitive-pavilion-achim-menges-architect-in-collaboration-with-oliver-david-krieg-and-steffen-reichert/

Page 18. Tadao Ando Church of LightSource: http://www.adamfriedberg.com/blog/2013/06/12/tadao-andos-church-of-the-light-in-ibaraki-japan/

Page 18. Greg Lynn Korean Presbyterian ChurchSource: http://www.suckerpunchdaily.com/2010/06/20/korean-presbyterian-church/

Page 19. LavaSource: http://www.l-a-v-a.net/projects/green-void

Page 22 & 23. Aqua TowerSource: http://studiogang.net/work/2004/aqua-towerPage 23. Modular Lego SystemSource: http://www.reefdesignlab.com/modular-assembly/

Page 27. Sea SpongeSource: http://cwf-fcf.org/assets/images/WILD-Classes-Photographs/Foster-Cohen-Grade-7/10_iStock_000000708012Small.jpg

Greg Lynn Quote: < http://www.ted.com/talks/greg_lynn_on_organic_design/transcript>

Terzidis, K. (2006), Algorithmic Architecture, Burlington MA: Elsevier Ltd

Tony Fry, Design Futuring: Sustainability, Ethics and New Practice ( Oxford: Berg, 2009)

Richard William (2005). ‘Architecture and Visual Culture’, in Exploring Visual Culture; Definitions, Concepts, Contexts, ed. By Matthew Rampley (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press)

Howard David, The Culture of Building (USA: Oxford University Press, 2000)

REFERENCES

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