AIR DESIGN STUDIO AIR HAN LI
CONTENTS
PART 0 INTRODUCTION
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PART A CONCEPTUALISATION A 0.1 DESIGN FUTURING A 0.2 DESIGN COMPUTATION A 0.3 COMPOSITION / GENERATION A 0.4 CONCLUSION A 0.5 LEARNING OUTCOMES A 0.6 APPENDIX- ALGORITHMIC SKRTCHES
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P 09 P 14 P 20 P 26 P 27 P 28
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ABOUT ME
I was born on an extremely hot summer day in 1990 in a city of north China. My mother said my nature will just be like the passionate sun of that day. For almost two decades I doubt this superstitious statement until I encountered the notion of architecture design. I joined in the University of Melbourne, School of Environments in 2012, pursuing my dream and my mother’s prophecy. Architecture for me is not only a university course, but a constant experience to interact with the world, since I deeply believe that architecture forms the human society. Especially because of being born as a Chinese and exposed to traditional culture, I am craving to be able to introduce traditional philosophy into modern architecture, and therefore provide an influence on human’s future, no matter how little it is. I understand architecture as an interactive emotion generator to the user. Happiness, solitude, excitement, peacefulness, can be passed to the user through interacting. I have been trying to explore this understanding with some of my previous works. I experimented to create different means of interaction between users and architecture, such as circulation, visual vividness, and so on. Computational design is almost alien to me. This journal will document my first experience with parametric design to my further study of the interactive emtion generator. As you flip to the next page, my ship has sailed away from my comfort port, and into uncharted waters. Please enjoy!
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PREVIOUS PROJECT
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Glass Pavilion is my design proposal on Herring Island, Melbourne. The design brief requires a place of secret. The concept is to create an ambiguous definition of the boundary between public and privacy. The method is to overlay many layers of glazed panels vertically to blend the surrounding greenery and the architecture together. Sun light travels through glazed panels, distorted and dispersed, generating intriguing light effect. Space with dramatic changes in elevation and volume is arranged inside the glazed panels, encouraging an explorative experience of the users. Trees are planted inside to further enhance the ambiguity.
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PART A. CONCEPTUALISATIN
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A. 01 DESIGN FUTURING
I think the first thing here is to differentiate design futuring from future design. Granted there are stereotypes or imaginary expectations on future design which possibly takes a dynamic shape and includes greenery within it. In fact, the imaginary expectation hardly involves any imagination because our brain photographed maybe too much screenshots from movies and video games. So is future design already designed prior to the arrival of future? Instead of discussing the style, form, or elements of a future design, design futuring should discuss the design methods and approach. Undeniably, digital technology is the most powerful driving factor that might shift design approach. Computational design has been constantly pushing the frontier of architecture design, as formalism is no longer resitricting designer's creativity. [1] With the help of new technology, the position of architects should be reconsidered as the overseers of the exchange of information integrating the disciplines. [2] This will drive architects to understand and evaluate the design project from a novel point of view. Based on design ethics, architects are granted with the opportunity to realize the design to the full maximum of quality in terms of spatial and experiential aspects and sustainability.
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PRECEDENT MOUNTAIN DWELLINGS BIG
Figure 1. Mountain Dwellings elevation, BIG Architects
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Figure 2. Mountain Dwellings residential units with rooftop gardens, BIG Architects
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he Mountain Dwellings is a high-density residential project in Copenhagen designed by BIG Architects. The idea is to present suburban townhouses with intensive urban density. [3] To achieve this, architects integrate the car park and townhouses together, minimizing the overall footprint, The car park is encased base with a slope where terraced houses are placed on. Sitting on a slope, each residential unit is allowed with a roof garden receiving adequate sun light and providing a splendid view. The roof gardens comprise plants that will gradually grow and spread over the timber cladding. As time passes, the building will blend in with its own plantation. The car park’s facade is made of perforated aluminium plates that create a reproduction of the Everest. Holes on the façade let in natural light in the car park and generate ventilation. The design concept truly proposes an advanced idea of modern and future way of living. It gives one solution to the reconciliation of high-quality living and low carbon living. Although it doesn’t have a fluid surface or anything appears to be too radical, it challenges the conventional philosophy if residential development and states the possibility of a better future.
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Figure 3. Royal Children's Hospital sun-shading system, Melbourne, Billard Leece Partnership and Bates Smart Architects
Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne Billard Leece Partnership and Bates Smart Architects
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he new Royal Children’s Hospital was completed in 2011, designed by Bates Smart Architects, is one of Melbourne’s architectural landmarks. The design team took an evidencebased approach by collecting data and resources on psychological research. This design strategy gives heavy emphasize on the what the young patients and their family members feel in the hospital and treatment process when exposed to a ‘green’ and friendly environment. [4] The front façade is equipped with a high-tech sun-shading system with leaf-like panels. The color of the panels changes from red
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Figure 4. Royal Children's Hospital interior design, Melbourne, Billard Leece Partnership and Bates Smart Architects
to green. The color scheme is mapped from Australian natural savanna, integrating the building with the Royal Park sitting behind. The inpatients block sits on the northwest side, facing the Royal Park. Each room possesses a view towards the leafy courtyard. Melbourne Royal Children’s Hospital is a fine example of what might be called future design. It redefined the design requirement of a hospital by shifting the center of medicine and surgery to patients which are especially children in this case.
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A. 02 DESIGN COMPUTATION A systemic approach Aided by the computation technology, the architecture design approach will be reconsidered as a bottom up approach, considering design as a system that is built up by individual components. I have been constantly wondering about an architect’s position, since I am always asked by friends and family members that “so you architects build houses or design the appearance?” It seems architects are positioned in an awkward position in the general public’s eye. For centuries there was not a profession called architects. Buildings were realized by the hands of highly experienced craftsmen. It is argued that architect was finally regarded as a separate profession in 1450s. [5] Not until recent years, architects were only use computers as a visualizing tool. Terzidis pointed out the difference between computerization and computation, as computerization is a duplication of designer’s mind yet computation is a designing tool. [6] Computational algorithm allows architects to form the building with accumulated data which can be managed individually within reasonable time. The opportunity provided by this enables architects to take consideration of the smallest components and manipulate them by imposing a rationally-thought rule of processing. It seems that a building is no longer a bulk or a skin, but like pixels performing as a holistic system. Namely, the design process is shifted away from a top-down to a bottom-up approach. This benefits the design in three ways. Computational algorithm optimize the combination of rationality and creativity of the design process. “For the first time perhaps, architectural design might be aligned with neither formalism nor rationalism but with intelligent form and traceable creativity.” [7] However, it requires the comprehensive ability from the
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architects to truly understand algorithmic thinking as it involves "understanding, executing, evaluating, and creating". [8] It is selfevident that computation algorithm can process a large amount of data which human brains are not capable of, and therefore visualize it. Thus designers are able to push their boundary of creativity regardless of the limitation of human brain data process. However, as a constructed object, a building has to be designed with rational evaluation process, such as structural performance, environmental design aspect. Algorithm is a stepwise method to allow parameters of rationality to be inserted into it in a controlled manner. Therefore, creativity and rationality can have dialogue and reconcile with each other, and optimize their combination as an outcome. Computational algorithms act as a universal language across multidisciplines that sustain the communication between architects, engineers, consultants and constructors. Hence a healthily controlled design to fabrication flow is ensured. And structural and service components can be used in an expressive way of architects' creativity. Computational algorithms celebrate the value of individuality and encourage democratic design. Starting from small scaled components and simple rules of the inter-relationship, the space quality and performance of each component (which could be a residential unit of a skyscraper for example) is respected and investigated through the design process. Rather than dominated by an arbitrary form imposed from top down, components dictates the overall form through algorithms.
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Figure 5. Absolute Towers, MAD Architectss
PRECEDENT ABSOLUTE TOWERS MAD ARCHITECTS
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bsolute Towers was proposed by MAD architects in 2006 and built in Canada. The project comprises two high-rise residential towers that adapt the same method. Each tower uses same floor plan from the bottom to the top, but is rotated by different degrees. Therefore, each family unit enjoys a balcony with a 360 degree view fully exposed to the sky. [9] The design process of Absolute Towers was aided by computation, to realize the controlled rotation and to optimize the rotation degree. Consequently, the second tower could be rapidly produced after the construction of the first one. In this case, parametric designing method is adapted to design not only an element for the project but a carefully tested system which is responsive to the site and desirable satisfaction. The faรงade is a spontaneous outcome, rather than an arbitrarily ornamental skin. Or maybe there is even not a faรงade.
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SERPENTINE PAVILION 2013 SOU FUJIMOTO
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esigned by Sou Fujimoto, Serpentine Pavilion of 2013 is one the most sought-after architecture in recent years. “I tried to create something between nature and architecture, melding nicely into its surroundings�. [10] The architect achieved this cloudlike blurry geometry by manipulating something rather rigid and solid ---- steel grids. However, these grids were duplicated by over 26,000 times so that the whole started to lose its shape and erase its boundary. The whole process of the design was heavily relied on parametric
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geometry generation technology, especially to finally realize it in terms of fabrication and construction. Structural solution is paramount in parametric process. Polycarbon disks and panels are wisely inserted to the steel grids to provide sheltering and platforms. Spaces were created and varied with in the architecture to cater various activities, such as having a drink, meeting friends, and even just finding a nice spot to kill time. Therefore, this project is an excellent demonstration of democratic design that allows each individual to embrace it in various ways.
Figure 6. Serpentine Pavilion, Sou Fujimoto
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A. 03 COMPOSITION/GENERATION As computation brings revolutionary understanding of architecture and design, the top-down approach is no longer the only way of architecture design. Conventionally, designers start from an overview of the project, and then break down the system into subsystems. Each sub-system is analyzed and refined to a great extent. Opposite to the top-down approach, generative approach starts from individual elements which are imposed by a series of encoded rules, and hence generates the emergence and growth. One of the highlight of generative approach I think is that it frees designers from precedents and bias. As I argued in the above, imagination is unavoidably shaped and constrained by what we see. By taking the generative approach, rather than design the form or shape, designers design the algorithm of processing data. The eventual outcome of the emergence can be unpredictable and beyond imagination. It also stimulates the evolution of fabrication technology. The attention to the coding process also helps the designers to gain control over the variables of the design. The rules of processing the data can be generated from the technical specifications of the project, such as mechanical parameters of a spanning member in a building. This means that although the final geometry is unpredictable, the dominating principle keeps the same. In this way, generative approach has potential to express designer's idea throughout the project to implement structural members with aesthetical values. However, the application of generative approach to architecture design has its limitation. The first reason is that a building is an extremely complicated system that is hard to be mapped by only geometric manipulation. Sole dependence on the generative outcome might result in the compromise of the building’s functionality. The rejection of any precedents could lead to the negation of human’s living and behavior habit which dates from history. As we see in some projects, the practice of generative
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approach usually contributes to parts of the whole building. Additionally, the scale of the starting elements could be underinvestigated. It is easy for designers to be trapped by the geometry that might end up as a mere ornamental shell without any link to the site condition or performance requirement. I propose that the starting element of the generative approach in architectural design should include a minimal functional unit in order to truly apply the approach to architecture.
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PRECEDENT ICD/ITKE RESEARCH PAVILION UNIVERSITY OF STUTTGART
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he design is research project based in the University of Stuttgart, exploring the marriage between high-tech light-weight material and biomimetic study.
The design takes a new approach to the adaption of fibercomposite to architecture by using robotic fabrication. The structure is composed by 36 modules which have two layers of carbon fiber. Customized robotic fabricator delivers the process in a highly controlled manner. The whole process was engaged by computation aid, which in this case demonstrates its advantage of marrying rationality (light-weight structural performance) and creativity (biomimetic geometry into architecture). Moreover, by providing a computational code or language, it is able to transfer the entire fabrication process which is unmanageable by human to robotic machines. Building up the whole pavilion, individual hexagonal components also perform as lounges or light well, enhancing the user experience and spatial quality.
Figure 7. ICD/ITKE Research Pavilion, University of Stuutgart
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Figure 8. ICD/ITKE Research Pavilion robotic machine, University of Stuutgart
Figure 9. ICD/ITKE Research Pavilion module diagram, University of Stuutgart
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SILK PAVILION MEDIATED MATTER GROUP, MIT
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his project explores the duality of digital design and biological fibre-fabrication on an architectural scale. It comprises two phases. The first phase is the digital design and fabrication of the primary structure, using algorithmic data processing for the geometry in a generative environment based on Grasshopper. And the second phase deploys thousands of silkworms to spin a secondary envelope on the primary scaffolding. [11] The generative geometry is dictated by a set of constrains. The first set is the fabrication constrains informed by the robotic machine. The second set is mapped from the solar trajectory and radial openings to generate organizational fibre variation. The third set of constrains conforms the biological characteristic of silkworms.
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Figure 10. Silk Pavilion digital fabrication, Mediated Matter Group
Figure 11. Silk Pavilion , Mediated Matter Group, MIT
What this project has achieved is that it proposes a template fabrication approach to the designing and making fiber-based project. It values the rationality in the digital fabrication process of the load-bearing structure by adapting a parametric environment that enabling iteration between form and fabrication. It also succeeds in the biological substructure which reinforces the primary structure. This second skin documents the dynamic bio-fabrication process in real time, which reveals the honesty of the research. It affirms the relationship between digital fabrication and biological fibre system. The potential of the material is also explored.
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A. 04 CONCLUSION
Computational design presents the opportunity to push the boundary of architecture in terms of creativity as well as construction. It has been explored and practiced in a variety of projects. It marries aesthetic with technology, which creates projects with a level of creativity and rationality. As the research and development on computational design, architects are no longer constrained in their marginal working scope of façade designing and zoning, but freed to engage and collaborate with disciplines of building industry and bring the outcome to another level of quality. Generative design approach introduces algorithm into architecture, proposing another way of thinking. Although it has its limitation, generative approach broadens the scope of possible solutions to architecture in form, structure and performance. It incorporates form structured and performance as a holistic whole by combining algorithmic generation of the design and architect’s rational evaluation of the situation.
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A. 05 LEARNING OUTCOME
In the first stage’s researches, I start to understand what is behind those designs with what seems to a radical and fancy appearance. The difference between computerization and computation is crucial to understand algorithmic design. With the designer’s ability of computation, digital designing process is not a mere reproduction of designer’s idea in mind, but a driving force to promote the designer’s creativity by sorting and processing data in a way that is beyond human brain’s calculating ability. Yet I believe designers must rely on their own judgment of the computational production. A rational evaluation against different potential solutions is of vital importance, and modifications can be made and experimented to optimize the final outcome. Therefore, I believe the relationship between computation and designers is a loop of information what feed back onto each other. In the coming stage relating to LAGI project, I shall try to use the generative approach to further explore its potential. The LAGI project’s brief calls for an urban land art which generates energy, which underlines the integration of aesthetical value and structural and environmental technology. Hence, generative design approach by using algorithm is promising to help me produce something challenging and innovative for the site, and for me.
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A. 06 APPENDIX ALGORITHMIC SKETCHES These two tasks show the progression of the definition by experimenting with algorithm. I learned to understand and have conversation with the digital model. It requires algorithmic thinking from me for the iteration of the parameters.
In the attractor points task, based on one attractor point on a 2D grid. I deployed two attractor points and an attractor curve to increase the complexity of the grid system. In order to achieve that, I had to analyze the relationship between the individual element and search for the pattern underneath the geometry. It is a process of sorting of rationalizing the thinking of my design intend and feeding back on the design. This task also inspired me regarding to the LAGI project which I can use this definition to develop the relationship between circulation, solar trajectory, view framing, structure organization and geometry.
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In the tartan pattern task I used mathematical definition such as series to add more details of the geometry. I used item list to document two series of points and created arcs in between and then connect arcs together to create a woven and interlocking effect. I also find the panel tool is extremely helpful to record data and serve as a reminder of what is happening and what should be done next.
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REFERENCES 1. Terzidis, Kostas. Algorithmic Architecture. MA: Elsevier, Boston, 2006. 2. Kieran, Stephen, and James Timberlake. Refabricating Architecture: How Manufacturing Methodologies are Poised to Transform Building Construction. McGraw-Hill, New York, 2004. 3. Bjarke Ingels Group. Bjarke Ingels Group Recent Projects. A.D.A EDITA, Tokyo, 2012. 4. Goad, Philip. "Ryal Children's Hospital", Australian Design Review, May 14, 2014. URL: http://www.australiandesignreview.com/ architecture/19756-royal-children’s-hospital. 5. Kalay, Yehuda. Architecture's New Media. MIT Press, 2004. 6. Terzidis, Kostas. Algorithmic Architecture. MA: Elsevier, Boston, 2006. 7. Terzidis, Kostas. Algorithmic Architecture. MA: Elsevier, Boston, 2006. 8. Browm, Wayne. Introduction to Algorithmic Thinking. 9. Lagendijk, Bas, Pignetti, Anthony & Vacilotto, Sergio, 2012. " Case Study: Absolute World Towers", CTBUH Journal 2012 Issue IV. 10. Sou Fujimoto. Serpentine Gallery Pavilion 2013. Serpentine Gallery and Koenig Books, London, 2013. 11. N. Oxman, J. Laucks, M. Kayser, J. Duro-Royo, C. GonzalesUribe, 2014. "Silk Pavilion: A Case Study in Fiber-based Digital Fabrication", FABRICATE Conference Proceedings, Fabio Gramazio, Matthias Kohler, Silke Lan enber (eds.) ta Verla, pp. 248-255.
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