Normative Position on Construction
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| Conceptual Sketch - Sustainability Project 2012 |
2012/06/16 Continual Practice Development Essay
DESIGN
+
CONSTRUCTION
FREE OF PRESCRIPTION
Introduction
Neither
design nor construction results in architecture on its own, which is why it is
imperative that they have an intrinsic understanding of each other’s functional
objectives. A design is essentially a problem solving intention, and
construction is act of the intentions actual materialisation.
Both designers and constructors are armed with
an abundance of new technology at their disposal, designs can be virtually
simulated and therefore understood in finer detail, and new materials and
construction techniques enter the field faster than they can be mastered. It is
therefore apparent that the architect’s creativity need no longer be limited to
familiar precedent; technology can aid construction to take more forms than
ever previously imagined.
Design +
Construction should not be dealt with as separate entities but rather as
interdependent practices that result in architecture, therefore my normative
position deliberately groups its intentions with both.
·
Design + Construction must never be limited to adhering to a ‘style’, it
should be information based not form based – not prescribe to a predefined
‘look’
·
Design + Construction must utilise global technologies to be redesigned to
simulate a local response to site and social conditions
·
Design + Construction must embrace the virtual prototype as a design and
communications medium and actively encourage open participation in design
·
Design + Construction should involve the use of innovative smart materials
in order to achieve a dynamic, interactive relationship between a building, its
users and the environment
·
Design + Construction should resolve the alienation between humanity and
machines through customised automation and human centred production systems
·
Design + Construction must take on a sustainable design centred approach,
from production to re cycling of materials and must have a customised response
to its local climate for maximum energy efficiency
·
Design + Construction must be self-organizing. Architecture must not be a
fixed or final product, but is more like a biological organism, continuously
learning about itself and its surroundings, adapting to changing conditions and
improving its own performance.
·
Design + Construction must follow the principles of biodiversity as in
nature. Innovation in design requires
the parallel development of alternative approaches and cross fertilization of
ideas, no less than evolution requires the multiplication and cross
fertilization of biological species.
THE NEW PALETTE
‘Designers enamoured with their new
tools are frantically casting about in search of a theoretical framework or any
kind of hook with which they can make sense of the boundless shapes and geometries
that their computers enable them to generate.’
Looking back into the past will not provide the answers
questioned here, the nostalgic role of the architect must change, in the fast
paced, ever changing developing world, we no longer need single entry craftsman
but rather master programmers able to navigate progression towards a
sustainable future. New technology must be embraced, understood and
manipulated; Michelangelo would not have restricted himself to stone arches if
his time afforded him with the luxury of the lengthy I beam.
The end of the master builder
The master
builder is now irrelevant or perhaps rather inefficient. The 21st
century is the information age, the architects’ role is not to master all
facets of construction design but rather master the art of utilising the
abundance of new technology available.
The architect has new tools, software can extend/enhance the architects
problem solving capabilities. Information is the fundamental raw material of
our century and software is the tool we use to process it, our decision making
capacity calls for criteria - rather than knowledge. [2]
Fluid societies require fluid architecture
“Architecture finds
itself at the midpoint of an on-going cycle of innovative adaptation –
retooling the discipline and adapting the architectural and urban environment
to the socioeconomic era of post-fordism. The mass society that was
characterized by a single, nearly universal consumption standard has evolved
into the heterogenous society of the multitude”[3]
P Schmuacher
In a world or developing culture driven by immediacy, efficiency and globalisation; architecture in its most basic framework needs to encompass a new degree of flexibility to accommodate this rapid change in need driven by technological advancement and (unfortunately) fashion.
Nostalgia stagnates creativity, and globalisation imposes
false identities on dissimilar cultures. Nostalgia and globalisation only
hinder the architects’ creativity and therefore the richness of architectural
design outcome. Stylised architecture will always face the risk of becoming
irrelevant, so it is the role of the designer to construct the building
envelope as a morphological form able to accommodate a change in need over
time.
The architect must therefore design free from inhabiting
fixes, using a pallet of highly adaptable forms and materials
The term ‘craftsmanship’ has nostalgic connotations; a
craftsman is thought of as a person who uses their own hands to execute a
design with great skill through their intensive understanding of their
materials and acute ability to manipulate them.
So when there is a marriage between Computer Aided Design and
Computer Aided Manufacture a new understanding of ‘craftsmanship’ comes to the
fore. Designs can be explored in fine detail, synthesised into 3 dimensional
virtual models and then executed with absolute precision.
Norman Foster has completely embraced this manipulation of
technology directly into architecture. When it came to designing the Swiss Re
in London, Foster and Partners modelled an extremely comprehensive virtual
model of the entire structure, including every single bolted connection.
Schmidlin wrote their own special software linking the 3D model directly to the
CNC machines on the production line. [5]
Computer aided design is finally moving beyond simply replicating the hand
drawn format and becoming useful as a direct translation between the virtual
synthesis and the actual built reality.
Sustainability
It is no longer a question of myth or legend that our earth’s
resources are finite. It is therefore absolutely imperative that sustainable
discourse is the fundamental driver behind every decision making process when
dealing with both design and construction.
Learning from nature can be a useful tool for adapting design to work
well within our natural environments, not just through innovative bio mimicry
but also through an understanding of bio diversity and the reliance of parts to
the whole. There is no need to limit our palette of materials to the tangible
constraints of earth and timber, advancements in biology and a new
understanding of nanoscale architecture can also inform architectural ideas.
Architect Mitchel Joachim has equipped his architecture studio with micro biology lab and has started creating neoplasmatic building materials from a cellular scale. Joachim has already ‘ grown’ his own architectural envelope, a synthesised scaled prototype of a victimless ‘meat house’. This is an architectural proposal for the fabrication of 3D printed extruded pig cells to form real organic dwellings. It is intended to be a "victimless shelter", because no sentient being was harmed in the laboratory growth of the skin .[6]
Parametricism - as a style [7]
“So in the context of this machine- mediated discourse, compositional
principles that have long been taken as apodictic suddenly look arbitrary.
Complicated curved surfaces may be no harder to produce than planar,
cylindrical, spherical and conical ones. So why stick to classical
architectural geometries?”[8]
Technology is a privilege and the ample opportunities it
provides to the designers palette and newfound flexibility within construction.
The capabilities of local craft tradition no longer define the domain of
possibilities that the designer can explore.
Patrik Schumacher is responsible for the defining Parametric
Style, a style synonymous with avant-garde architecture utilising computer aided
design to simulate and construct complex architectural forms.
“The task is to develop an
architectural and urban repertoire that is geared up to create complex,
polycentric urban and architectural fields which are densely layered and
continuously differentiated.”
Schumacher disassociates ‘style’ from having anything to do
with a matter of appearance, but asks for a move to understand style as a
design research programme.
Schumacher challenges designers to explore and compete
within this ‘style’ as the differentiation of formal out comes are infinite as
the new primitives can be described as animate, dynamic and interactive entities
– splines, nurbs, and subdivs – that act as building blocks for dynamic
systems.Conclusion
Design and construction have become empowered by
technological advancement, design is enriched with the privilege of virtual simulation
and construction can be carried out with extreme precision and flexibility with
the help of computer aided machinery. The media driven global society demands
the same sort of consideration in the synthesis of their dwellings as they do
in their everyday tools. Craftsmanship can now be understood using a new set of
rules related to computer aided precision rather than pain staking learnt
mastery and sustainability can be researched in conjunction with nature and
natural systems to inspire a new paradigm of truly integrated biological
design. Parametricism maybe the term we one day use to describe this new type
of architecture that will evolve from computer aided design, even though our
few current examples remain within the avant-garde, this is where all
well-established design principles originate, free from the limitations of
nostalgia.
Bibliography
Abel, C, Architecture,
Technology and Process, Architectural Press, United Kingdom, 2004
Addington, M,
Smart Materials and New Technologies; for architectural and design professions,
Architectural Press, Harvard University, United Kingdom, 2005
Alcazar, I
et al, The Metapolis Dictionary of Advanced Architecture, city technology and
society in the information age, Actar,
Barcelona, 2003
Joachim, M,
Terreform 1, Nonprofit Organization for Philanthropic Architecture, Urban +
Ecological Design, Mycoform, Site Accessed, 26/03/2012, http://www.terreform.org/projects_habitat_mycoform.html
Mitchell, W,
The Virtual Dimension, Antitectonics: The Poetics of Virtuality,
Princeton Architectral Press, New York,
1998
Schumacher,P,
Parametricism as Style - Parametricist Manifesto, Presented and discussed at the Dark Side Club
, 11th Architecture Biennale, Venice 2008
[1] The basis for my normative position was
influenced by Chris Abels Manifesto for Bio tech Architecture
[3] Schmaucher,
P, Parametricism as Style - Parametricist Manifesto, 2008
[4] Abel, C, Architecture, Technology and
Process, 2004
[5] Abel,
C, Architecture, Technology and Process, 2004
[6] Joachim, M, Terreform One, 2006 - 2008
[7] Schmaucher, P, Parametricism as Style -
Parametricist Manifesto, 2008
[8] Mitchell, W, Antitectonics: the Poetics of
Virtuality,1998
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