re. craft JUNE
29/05 to 05/06
MAY
www.indesem.nl
SEM
SEM
www.indesem.nl
excursion. AMSTERDAM.
excursion. ROTTERDAM.
re.craft investigating innovations in the manufacturing industry and highlighting its impact on the architectural practice.
workshop. lectures. ORANGE HALL.
workshop. lectures. ORANGE HALL.
workshop. lectures. ORANGE HALL.
2. june 2015 3. june 2015 4. june 2015
opening. ORANGE HALL.
presentation. jury conclusion. end speech. ORANGE HALL.
5. june 2015
29. may 2015 30. may 2015 31. may 2015 1. june 2015
07. april 2015 workshop. lectures. ORANGE HALL.
international INDE design seminar
APPLICATION DEADLINE
www.indesem.nl
investigating innovations in the manufacturing industry and highlighting its impact on the architectural practice.
international INDE design seminar JUNE
29/05 to 05/06
MAY
PRE.PUBLICATIO N inside
In 1965, the first production laser cutting machine was used to drill holes in diamond dies. This machine was made by the Western Electric Engineering Research Center.
‘69
In 1969 Victor Scheinman at Stanford University invented the Stanford arm, an all-electric, 6-axis articulated robot designed to permit an arm solution.
3D-PRINTING
‘65
ROBOTIC ARM
LASERCUTTING
1965
“Depicting an as yet unbuilt reality as accurately as possible on paper or in clay, cardboard or polystyrene is largely the result of an act that may be termed as ‘craftsmanship’ - a skill honed by repetition and practice. Here craftsmanship means a knowledge system based on skills that are developed in the course of the act. The skill is enhanced by altering the initial idea and retracing the vague sketch over and over again, and thus gradually improving them, in the act of design. This craftsmanship is the heart of design.
‘84
The more complex 3D printing started in 1984 when Charles (Chuck) Hull invented a process that is called stereolithograph. This process can be done by layers that are added by curing photopolymers.
‘85
Computers and CNC machine tools continue to develop rapidly. The personal computer revolution has a great impact on this development. By the late 1980s small machine shops had desktop computers and CNC machine tools.
is interesting to reach this extreme quality, but it is only a small fraction of the total demand. The efficiency the production methods have to offer could bring really cheap customized and dismountable housing for example. What do you think the impact on society would be? Many people think digital fabrication is something new, but for instance IKEA has been using CNC milling for making its furniture for decades. At the moment it is interesting to see what the development for architecture and the larger scale would mean. I think it would
“But now the computer has become the opposite: since it enables us to document the designed object precisely and describe it with infinite accuracy, it would seem to provide endless scope for individual expression. Yet in practice it has led to great uniformity and lack of variety. Work by different designers is
‘00
MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) was thinking further than processes like electrical discharge machining and milling. Processes where metal could be added instead of just removing metal to get the right shape.
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In 2003 the first 3D printer was introduced on the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment. This was a gypsum based 3D printer.
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In 2005 the first lasercutter and CNC-miller were introduced on the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment in Delft.
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in 2006 at ETH Zurich, Gramazio & Kohler, an architectural partnership that is especially known for its contribution to digital fabrication and robotic construction, taught at class using a robot arm to lay bricks.
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From 2007 the use of rapid prototyping has had a significant impact on speeding up the iterative aspect of the design process.
It remains for individuals to adopt and then adapt these things, to evaluate them as opposed to other alternatives that are also available, and to finally reveal the true potential and the really valuable contribution each new tool provides. Continuously reflecting on both past and future can be a guide to renewal. This also applies to craft in relation to digital techniques. What is the value you give as an architect to the pleasure of the builder? The love of making things with your hands. The sensibility of materials, where they come together in the detail.
JORGE MEJIA
In the late 19th century Bell invented the phone. The smartphone we now use can be interpreted as decades of innovation and adaption of Bell’s invention. These new technologies, like the smartphone, remind me of what is permanent and what is temporary. What matters is that the things in common will last. What binds us, regardless time or position. In the end, the role of the architect is ever-changing, if you assume it from a scientific vantage point. That is always positive, because it enables us to assume all we do as a contribution to a larger intellectual endeavour, which we all appear to trust as a vehicle for personal, both mental and spiritual, fulfilment.
WANT TO PARTICIPATE? If you would like to take part in the InDeSem’15 seminar, you are invited to submit a proposal for the design competition, due to the limited amount of participants we can receive. BACKGROUND We find ourselves on the verge of a pioneering age of transformation. For decades mass production separated thinking and making. The architect was placed far away from the actual production process and therefore cut off from the development and innovation of production. At this moment we see a shift in these positions. Digital fabrication offers not only great new technical possibilities; it also enables new ways of distribution, personalization and sharing and therefore brings the designer closer to the actual process of making. How do these developments present themselves in relation to architectural quality? Will the architect achieve a greater extent of sophistication and uniqueness in design when using these technical developments? Does this mean a revival of the craftsman in architecture?
techniques. Will it benefit or impair our surroundings? Will it enrich the possibilities in form, materialisation and construction dramatically? Will it lead to a lean design process, in less time and more control over cost, etc? Will it reduce the need for physical labour and create a richer and unique architecture? And will these new techniques ultimately close the gap between the professional and the layman? Envision a utopian future regarding the new digital fabrication techniques, through a specifically formulated hypothesis. Specify how you think the role of the architect, architecture and the built environment will change with the increase of these techniques. Use a specific location in your living environment to illustrate your vision. Speculate on how these techniques will change this environment, choosing from the scale of products and rooms, to buildings and cities. Describe in words and one clear image.
HAND-IN Package these three files as: .rar, .zip or similar with a maximum total size of 5MB. Name your file as: surname.name_indesem2015competition. Send this before the 7th of April 2015 to competition@indesem.nl.
IMAGE
COMPETITION
Digital fabrication techniques have the potential to dramatically change the shape of our living environment. But how exactly will the city change and in which shape will digital fabrication change our lives? Will current crafting methods be abandoned or will they co-exist with new digital fabrication
‘11
a3 landscape 420mm
TEXT title location hypothesis text max 300 words
€ 89, -
ASSIGNMENT
INCL w UD accoorkshopING s m
a4 portrait 210mm
odat mea ion drinkls s
PERSONAL INFO full name and address date of birth email address home university & faculty motivation max 300 words title of submission
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There’s a reason why they call it the Ultimaker Original – because you get to create your very own one-of-a-kind 3D printer. By building it yourself out of lasercut wooden panels you learn how everything comes together so you can morph it into whatever you want.
‘12
Jelle Veeringa started to use the Robotic Arm on architecture in the master Hyperbody at the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment in Delft.
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The architectural interest in robotics is well represented by the recent Rob/Arch 2012 conference in Vienna. The conference attempted to create a platform that shows the innovative uses of robotic fabrication in the creative industry.
Last year Pieter bought an old 5,2 meter long CNC milling machine to upgrade his hut-making skills with highend digital production technologies. Currently, Pieter is building the first fully CNC-milled house of The Netherlands with his startup ECO-nnect.
* Do not put your name on the image and text file for fair judgement. Speakers and workshop leaders will judge the competition entries.
a4 portrait 210mm
WINNERS WILL BE ANNOUNCED TWO WEEKS AFTER THE COMPETITION DEADLINE!
‘13
Dus Architects have developed the KamerMaker (Room Maker), a 3D Printer big enough to print chunks of buildings, up to 2x2x3.5 meters high. The chunks can then be stacked and connected together like LEGO bricks. This way a whole canal house can be printed.
LANDSCAPE HOUSE
1969
Disclaimer In production this publication, we have used a small number of images and text for which copyright holders could not be identified. In such cases, it has been our assumption that these images belong to the public domain. If you claim ownership of any of the images or texts presented here and have not been properly identified, please contact InDeSem 2015.
“The role of the computer is another key factor in understanding the process of division of labour. The first use of the computer in art and architecture was supposed to erase the artist’s, composer’s or architect’s personal signature. The calculations and changes made by the computer were purely arithmetical and seemingly objective: the drawn result was the outcome of algorithms devoid of arbitrary personal taste.” […]
2013
‘30
Dutch architecture studio Universe Architecture is planning to construct a house with a 3D printer for the first time. The Landscape House will be printed in sections using the giant D-Shape printer, which can produce sections of up to 6 x 9 meters using a mixture of sand and a binding agent.
297mm
Online www.indesem.nl facebook.com/indesem info@indesem.nl
JORGE MEJIA
discovered through YouTube and sharing music, like Spotify does. So if you look at other sectors the rise of the Internet and new production technologies have already caused a major revolution. We can call it an Industrial Revolution once the whole chain has changed. Architecture is a difficult sector to change as not everything is available yet. The techniques will have to improve and the materials optimized. But I think it is going to transform our sector as well. It will probably
What can be a threat for the architect? A real threat is that not the architects become the 21st century Masterbuilders, but contractors, developers or big companies with a narrow focussed idea of design. This especially happens if architects keep using digital fabrication technologies mainly to create gimmicks for the high-end market. It will stigmatize the idea of architects as stylists; additional actors in luxury iconic projects but not offering significant value in processes for the other 99% of buildings. Sooner or later a big contractor, Ikea or Google might see the potential of a more pragmatic use of digital fabrication in architecture and overflow the In 2011 the first plastic market. Instead, architects could 3D-printer was presented at the Faculty of Architecture already deepen their knowledge and the Built Environment in of digital fabrication and use the Delft. This printer uses plastic closed gap between designing materials for the printing process. and making to integrate skills and intelligences at the core of architecture.
“MASS CUSTOMIZATION HAS GREAT POTENTIAL FOR THE WAY WE SHAPE OUR SOCIETY.”
CNC-MILLING
Office BG. Oranje zaal Julianalaan 132-134 2628 BL Delft
Could you tell us a bit more about your affinity with the topic of InDeSem 2015 - re.craft? What fascinates me the most is the potential integration between architecture and engineering, so besides developing an architectural concept, developing this all the way to the 1:1 scale. My interest in digital fabrication grew when following lectures by Neil Gershenfeld at MIT. They think of the wide range of the possibilities that digital fabrication techniques have to offer, not just the 0,1% of the customers that ask for double curved surfaces. Of course it
MICHIEL RIEDIJK
The growing possibilities of new technologies generate new ways of creating, making, distribution, personalization and sharing. Digital fabrication not only offers great new technical possibilities, it may also bring the designer closer to the actual process of making again. The relation between the skill of the making and the quality on the final product is applicable to architecture. The design quality should continuously be tested by means of thinking and doing. New fabrication techniques can give the designer new insights in the design process as models can be tested and made easily. Designers and architects have always communicated through sketches, models, diagrams and charts. These means have, in addition to communicating with others, a role in the design process. One could say the architect comes closer to the design again, as the architect of the past. Or does the distance between the architect and his design become bigger with the decrease of hand drawings?
“Architecture is about ideas. The architect produces a design in reply to a question from a client, and believes the design is the most appropriate answer to the initial question or spatial need. The architectural design thus always represents the designer’s conceptual position in relation to the project, and reveals his range of different ideas about it. Ideas about the project, the social relevance of the design, spatiality and materiality, and the relationship between the designer and his own discipline are implicitly, and sometimes explicitly, reflected in the ultimate design. The designer’s ideas solidify into drawings, scale models and texts.” […]
How will it affect the architect? For architects it is important to gain knowledge about this topic, as it has so much potential for their profession. By developing a design with the ‘making’ in mind, architects could take away the middle man. Via a direct file-to-factory process offered by digital fabrication technologies, architects can keep control of the quality of a realized design. This idea refers back to the idea of the Masterbuilder, a real ‘uomo universale’, at the beginning of the Renaissance. This person guaranteed the quality throughout the whole process: from development, design, engineering to production and assembly on site. The invention of the perspective drawing fragmented this role; the masterbuilder could now communicate his ideas on paper. It separated the design and making. In the early 19th century the design itself was split into art and science. The potential of digital design- and production techniques is to reintegrate all these fragmented disciplines again.
The moment progress takes place, people seem to position themselves in favour of or against the new. Like the lovers and haters of electronic music in the late 60’s. This separation is worthy reflection upon. Choosing a side in this early debate is often nothing more than the revelation of an individual’s search for identity. Gradually, the debate recedes into the background. Traditional and new bridges, blends and there arises something unique. Exactly where this friction occurs, the most interesting things are about to happen. The same goes for these new techniques. I believe all new technologies, including 3D printing and computerized modelling, should fall into the architects’ toolbox and prove their worth, in straightforward competition with other tools and methods that also aim to solve pressing disciplinary problems of our time.
.DOCX
With the theme ‘re.craft’ InDeSem 2015 will discuss and reflect on the way immerging technologies may have an impact on the architecture practice. It is about being critical on the available tools, technologies and materials. Looking at the advantages and disadvantages to determine what can be used best to manufacture the wanted form and architecture. By asking critical questions and discuss the changes and opportunities we can develop more insight in our field, but also in the creative sector as a larger whole. Through lectures and a hands-on approach in the form of a workshop ideas will be exchanged and deepened.
especially affect the housing industry, creating housing custom made for the client. Mass customization has great potential for the way we shape our society.
How will it affect the role of the architect? Our business is in transition. The whole construction chain will change eventually. The user is going to be more central in the design process and will get closer to the architect again. The core business of the architect will not change. An architect is someone who knows how to put many ideas together and then visualize it. He can translate different needs of different people into an exciting model or website. That is something that will always remain as people will always need a clear view of what something is going to look like. In a more practical way I think the role of the architect will change, the architect will become a master builder again. There will be a direct connection between the design and the process of the making again.
Jorge Mejia was educated as an architect at the Universidad del Valle in Cali, Colombia. He holds a Master in history and theory of art and architecture as well as a master degree in architecture (2008). He teaches at the Universidad nacional de Colombia since February 2005, where he became a professor catedratico asociado in 2007. He started his PhD research on architectural methodology in 2010 at TU Delft. Simultaneously he has been tutoring students from the Design studios and theory seminar at a masters level during the past four years.
297mm
Board of InDeSem 15 Chairman Andreja Andrejevic Secretary Eline Degenaar Finance Floris Dreesmann Logistics Leonie Boelens Speakers Lars van Vianen Media Jani van Kampen
in 2009. The authors include the architects Michiel Riedijk, Sou Fujimoto, Kersten Geers and Gregg Pasquarelli. The book specifically wants to examine the position of the architect regarding craftsmanship.
Ir. Pieter Stoutjesdijk has graduated with honours from Delft University of Technology with a dual master’s degree in Architecture and Building Technology. His fascination for digital fabrication – intensified during his studies at Massachusetts Institute of Technology as an exchange student – found its way into his graduation project ‘The New Industrial Revolution’. In addition to exploring the effects of digital fabrication on society and building industry, he created a design process and a building system that takes optimal advantage of the possible direct link between our digital and physical world. One of his current activities is MaCuBs: Mass Customized Buildingsystems; a group of researchers and AE-students at the TU Delft working on the development of digitally fabricated building systems.
The tactile, the relational, and the incomplete are physical experiences that occur in the act of drawing. Drawing stands for a larger range of experiences, such as the way of writing that embraces editing and rewriting, or of playing music to explore again and again the puzzling qualities of a particular chord. The difficult and the incomplete should be positive events in our understanding; they should stimulate us as simulation and facile manipulation of complete objects cannot. The issue—I want to stress—is
PIETER STOUTJESDIJK
LASERCUTTING
Printing run 1000 Press Flyeralarm B.V. Publication march 2015
“WHAT COUNTS IS NOT WHAT THE DESIGNER MAKES, BUT HOW IT IS DONE AND WHAT IT IS BASED ON.”
By Leonie Boelens - board - InDeSem’15
How will it change our society? I think the role of the community is going to change a lot. In the future people will create online communities to try to be self-sufficient. They will select their world online and produce it. People will for instance form a group on Facebook and decide to build a tower. The user can shape their neighbourhood in a whole different way. As a result architecture is going to be more divers, especially cities.
By Marthe van Gils
.DOCX
Subsidised by Stylos Foundation, EFL Foundation, Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment
1985
“The boundaries of the architect’s craft can only be marked out by examining the architect’s position, taking account of the nature of the architectural composition and ultimately also the way in which the design is materialised. Craftsmanship is directly related to the organisation of working and production conditions in the designer’s studio. The nature of architectural production is also largely determined by the specific role the architect chooses to play in the design and construction process and his position in relation to it. What is crucial here is his position in relation to sociocultural developments or societal phenomena, such as the current emphasis on sustainability. His traditional position in the design and production of buildings is changing as a result of ever increasing division of labour. How should the architect design in today’s working and production conditions? As his role is transformed by division of labour, is he still capable of producing a relevant design?” […]
now indistinguishable, because they use the same computer techniques. The computer seems to disguise any precise expression of the designer’s chosen position. Its seemingly perfect representation of reality obscures his position and intentions. Computer generated drawings lack the selection mechanism inherent in manual sketches and drawings. Is the computer drawing then meaningless as a notation of architectural ideas, since there is seemingly no longer any need to distinguish between main and side issues?” […]
THOUGHTS 2030
HEDWIG HEINSMAN
ROBOTIC ARM, HYPERBODY
1984
Lay-Out Jani van Kampen
The 15 essays in ‘Architecture as a Craft’ present multiple visions on the architectural discipline and design in general, in which the essence is sought in the craft itself. It was published to mark the symposium of the same name held at the Delft University of Technology
Paradoxically, disciplinary conceptualisation about architecture begins with knowledge of the designer’s craftsmanship. In architecture, midway between a craft and a discipline, there appears to be a polarity between craftsman like action and disciplinary thinking. What counts is not what the designer makes, but how it is done and what it is based on.” […]
GYPSUM 3D-PRINTING
Contributors Andreja Andrejevic, Leonie Boelens, Floris Dreesmann, Eline Degenaar, Marthe van Gils, Jani van Kampen
By Floris Dreesman - board - InDeSem’15 Fragments taken from the prologue written by Michiel Riedijk of the book ‘Architecture as a craft’ (Riedijk, M. (2010). Architecture as a craft - Architecture, drawing, model and position. SUN. Amsterdam.)
INTERVIEW
be one of the last to change, as it is an expensive and heavy industry. But it is going to happen.
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Editorial board Eline Degenaar, Leonie Boelens
ARCHITECTURE AS A CRAFT
2012
“OUR DREAM IS TO MAKE UNIQUE AND CUSTOMIZED ARCHITECTURE AVAILABLE FOR EVERYONE”
RICHARDSENNET How could such a useful tool possibly be abused? When CAD first entered architectural teaching, replacing drawing by hand, a young architect at MIT observed that ‘‘when you draw a site, when you put in the counter lines and
MICHIEL RIEDIJK
The transition from the first to the second Industrial Revolution has had a large impact on the development of our buildings and cities, as well as on how these were created. Ever since the Industrial Revolution the design and making has been separated. The architect was placed far away from the actual production process and therefore separated from the development and innovation of production. Makers became the executers of the ideas produced on the drawing board. However, the last decade has seen a change. We stand at the start of the third Industrial Revolution, which is catalysed by technology and digital production. Digital fabrication techniques and innovation have the potential to rapidly change the shape of our living environment. It is time to investigate its impact on our society, on the scale of products and rooms, to buildings and cities.
2003
2000
MIT 3D-PRINTING
COLOFON
The process may change, but the outcome may certainly differ as well. Architecture may acquire a greater extent of sophistication and uniqueness in design when using these technical developments, as society’s response to the serial production of the past century. Technological innovation can create a richer and unique architecture. By making the architect is placed in a position to investigate the abilities and limitations of the material. When creating and making becomes one the designer may become the executor of buildings without the interference of a constructer or contractor. By means of 1:1 prototyping research is executed to investigate the possibilities of using digital fabrication techniques in the building industry. It may enable more and more on-site production, on scale and at an appropriate time.
2005
2006
Hedwig Heinsman graduated with honour from Delft Technical University in 2006. She also studied at Helsinki University of Technology in 2002 and lived in Helsinki where she ran the satellite office of DUS in 2006 - 2007 after co-founding the office in 2004. Raised in the Dutch Flevopolder, her interest lies in both utopic grand master planning and contemporary fashion and design. DUS builds ‘Public Architecture’: Design that consciously influences our daily life. This social significance shows at all levels of DUS’ work, ranging from large urban strategies to outdoor breakfast designs. DUS sees architecture as a craftsmanship and combines research and design with a ‘hands on’ approach and unique use of materials.
What do you think the impact on society would be? These new techniques will have implications on all different levels. The physical environment will change. Not only the role of the architect will change, there will be a shift in the whole building process and the role of everyone involved. Based on changes in other industries we can make assumptions on what is going to happen to the building industry. A major shift has taken place in the music industry for instance, in which twenty years ago no-one had realised the CD-player was the beginning of the digitalization of music. It led to the first iPod, iTunes, bands being
2011
2007
By Marthe van Gils, edited by Leonie Boelens - board - InDeSem’15
We live in an era of rapid technological change. With the emergence of interactive environments, adaptive architecture, datadriven design and new manufacturing techniques society as we know it can change dramatically. As a result, the role of the architect will be redefined inevitably.
has as much value and meaning as the artifact itself, inherently promoting explicit effects which are the result of a non-innocent affinity between machine and material. Such affinity may extend to include behavioral attributes with regards to the environment in which such a design (whether a building or building-element) may be situated. The built environment may be perceived as a multi-faceted expression of our affinity for, and instrumentalization of, its natural resources by means of appropriation. Much has been said and written about the metaphor of the extended organism. For instance, that the edifices constructed by animals are properly extended organs of physiology, or that primitive architectures are the outcome of spontaneous
An example of this misuse occurs in CAD (computer-assisted design), the software program that allows engineers to design physical objects and architects to generate images of buildings on-screen. The technology traces back to the work of Ivan Sutherland, an engineer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who in 1963 figured out how a user could interact graphically with a computer. The modern material world could not exist without the marvels of CAD. It enables instant modelling of products from screws to automobiles, specifies precisely their engineering, and commands their actual production. In architectural work, however, this necessary technology also poses dangers of misuse. […]
Computer-assisted design poses particular dangers for thinking about buildings. Because of the machine’s capacities for instant erasure and refiguring, the architect Elliot Felix observes, ‘‘each action is less consequent than it would be [on] paper . . . each will be less carefully considered. ’’Returning to physical drawing can overcome this danger; harder to counter is an issue about the materials of which the building is made. Flat computer screens cannot render well the textures of different materials or assist in choosing their colours, though the CAD programs can calculate to a marvel the precise amount of brick or steel a building might require. Drawing in bricks by hand, tedious though the process is, prompts the designer to think about their materiality, to engage with their solidity as against the blank, unmarked space on paper of a window. Computer-assisted design also impedes the designer in thinking about scale, as opposed to sheer size. Scale involves judgments of proportion; the sense of proportion onscreen appears to the designer as the relation of clusters of pixels. The object on-screen can indeed be manipulated so that it is presented, for instance, from the vantage point of someone on the ground, but in this regard CAD is frequently misused: what appears on-screen is impossibly coherent, framed in a unified way that physical sight never is. […]
INTERVIEW
What is your affinity with the topic of InDeSem 15 – re.craft? To DUS architecture is a craftsmanship. This can be seen in our most recent project, the 3D Print Canal House, where we are 3D printing an entire house as research into how new digital fabrication techniques can lead to affordable tailor-made architecture. DUS has its roots in housing projects. Especially in this part of architecture the user is often at great distance from the architect. Our dream is to make unique and customized architecture available for everyone, while at the moment this is an exclusive for a small group.
PIETER STOUTJESDIJK
THEME
CNC-MILLING
INDESEM 2015 WILL BE ORGANISED BY ANDREJA ANDREJEVIĆ, ELINE DEGENAAR, FLORIS DREESMANN, LEONIE BOELENS, LARS VAN VIANEN AND JANI VAN KAMPEN AS A FULLTIME BOARD, AND WILL BE ASSISTED BY MARTHE VAN GILS, TIWANEE VAN DER HORST, ROGIER FRANSSEN, LINA PENG AND RENS OTTENS.
Since the Industrial Revolution of the eighteenth century, the machine has seemed to threaten the work of artisan-craftsmen. The threat appeared physical; industrial machines never tired, they did the same work hour after hour without complaining. The modern machine’s threat to developing skill has a different character.
not nostalgia: her observation addresses what gets lost mentally when screen work replaces physical drawing. As in other visual practices, architectural sketches are often pictures of possibility; in the process of crystallizing and refining them by hand, the designer proceeds just as a tennis player or musician does, gets deeply involved in it, matures thinking about it. The site, as this architect observes, ‘‘becomes ingrained in the mind.’’ […]
ROB / ARCH VIENNA
INTERNATIONAL DESIGN SEMINAR
“THERE IS OBVIOUSLY MORE TO THE NOTION OF A RAPID CRAFT THAN SIMPLY HITTING THE POWER SWITCH”
more complicated than hand versus machine. Modern computer programs can indeed learn from their experience in an expanding fashion, because algorithms are rewritten through data feedback. The problem, as Victor Weisskopf says, is that people may let the machines do this learning, the person serving as a passive witness to and consumer of expanding competence, not participating in it. This is why Renzo Piano, the designer of very complicated objects, returns in a circular fashion to drawing them roughly by hand. Abuses of CAD illustrate how, when the head and the hand are separate, it is the head that suffers. […]
“CRAFTSMANSHIP NAMES AN ENDURING, BASIC HUMAN IMPULSE, THE DESIRE TO DO A JOB WELL FOR ITS OWN SAKE”
ULTIMAKER ORIGINAL PLASTIC 3D-PRINTING
Factory to file “In the words of David Pye, technology is “the study and extension of technique”. Technique denotes a specific approach for accomplishing a given task or function by way of perceiving and putting into use material integrity and processing methods. A hierarchical approach tends to prevail where fabrication methods and material considerations are only brought into the design process as final functional solutions, rather than offering design explorations, which are generative in nature. However, the material and technique in which a natural artifact has been formed is directly linked to its behavior. So, ways of making things are inextricably linked to what and how they serve as final artifacts. The work of the craftsman involves the knowledge and skill-set of particular practical arts. Craft has promoted the skill and knowledge of “knowhow;” it has elevated the notion of “technique” to a method of production informed by task and function. However, in many ways it was always considered a secret practice, a legacy. A craft of any kind that embodies the skill set and techniques of selecting and processing material is inherently apparent in the final object. Today, rapid prototyping technologies offer this knowledge to the people. But there is obviously more to the notion of a rapid craft than simply hitting the power switch. Machining is by convention a form of execution, a final phase. “File to Factory” protocols have indeed pushed
The name of this year’s theme ‘Re.Craft’ insinuates a revaluation of the concept of craft. Richard Sennet, teacher of sociology at New York University and at the London School of Economics, describes in his book ‘The Craftsman’ extensively how the concept of craft has changed throughout history. He sees craftsmanship as an enduring, basic human impulse, the desire to do a job well for its own sake. According to Sennet conducts every good craftsman a dialogue between concrete practices and thinking; this dialogue evolves into sustaining habits, and these habits establish a rhythm between problem solving and problem finding. In the book Sennet states different theses. In the first chapters, he argues that “all skills, even the most abstract, begin as bodily practices” and that “technical understanding develops through the powers of imagination”. According to Sennet has Western civilization a deep-rooted trouble in this bodily practice, in making connections between head and hand, in recognizing and encouraging the impulse of craftsmanship. Sennet explores in chapter one ‘the troubled craftsman’ the changing relationship between hand and head through introduction of CAD techniques in the design process of the architect:
the trees, it becomes ingrained in your mind. You come to know the site in a way that is not possible with the computer. You get to know a terrain by tracing and retracing it, not by letting the computer ‘regenerate’ it for you.’’ This is
3D PRINT CANAL HOUSE ECO-NNECT
NERI OXMAN Architecture and the Extended Organism “In his essay, “The gadget lover, Narcissus as Narcosis,” Marshall McLuhan defined the relation between media and self as an amalgam of tools and bodily extensions seamlessly at work. The “servomechanism” is an adaptation of the self to its technological extensions such that a closed system is created whereby the detection of such extensions as individual entities is unattainable. In this light, the designed artifact may be perceived as an entity weighted with commensurate “extensions.” The tool, technique, or technology applied for production
By Eline Degenaar - board - InDeSem’15 Fragments taken and revised from the book: Sennet, R. (2008). The Craftsman. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press
HEDWIG HEINSMAN
SEM 2015
Introduction “The distinction between matter (mechanics) and information (electronics) in the context of responsive building skins has promoted unique design protocols for integrating sensor technologies into material components.” [...] “The term “Rapid Craft” is proposed to describe such design protocols which couple material behavior and fabrication in the design of responsive skins. Rapid Craft is a designation for the incorporation of craft materialization knowledge within the framework of CNC processes of fabrication.” [...]
Master Craftsman: Matter Craftsman “In his writings, David Pye distinguishes between “regulated” and “free” craftsmanship, the latter as he claims provides for creativity in the process of making. Inherent to this distinction is the idea that craft promotes the ability to recreate and reinvent the association between tool, material and application beyond it serving as a form of execution. In this light, the rapid infiltration of technology into literally every bit of our existence has made us think twice before we write the software, or so it should. In the process of designing a sensate-responsive skin, this work integrates a wide range of skills and applications, from wood milling to the electronic programming of sensor-integrated circuits, in order to promote a holistic and integrative approach promoting a “rapid-craft.”
THE CRAFTSMAN
RICHARD SENNET
INDESEM (INTERNATIONAL DESIGN SEMINAR) IS ORGANIZED EVERY TWO YEARS BY STUDENTS OF THE FACULTY OF ARCHITECTURE AND THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT OF DELFT UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY. INDESEM IS WEEK FULL OF LECTURES AND A WORKSHOP WERE STUDENTS OF THE FACULTY AND INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS WORK ON A DESIGN PROJECT WITH A SPECIFIC GUIDING THEME. THE SEMINAR PROVIDES AN ENVIRONMENT WHERE STUDENTS, ARCHITECTS, THEORISTS AND TEACHERS CAN ENGAGE IN CONVERSATION WITH EACH OTHER ABOUT THE CURRENT AND FUTURE POSITION OF THE ARCHITECT. THE PURPOSE OF THE SEMINAR IS TO RAISE AWARENESS OF THE CONSEQUENCES OF THE CHANGING SOCIETY WITHIN THE ARCHITECTURAL WORLD.
Architect and designer Neri Oxman is the Sony Corporation Career Development Professor and Associate Professor of Media Arts and Sciences at the MIT Media Lab, where she founded and directs the Mediated Matter design research group. Her group conducts research at the intersection of computational design, digital fabrication, materials science and synthetic biology and applies that knowledge to design across scales from the micro scale to the building scale. Her goal is to enhance the relationship between the built and the natural environments by employing design principles inspired or engineered by Nature and implementing them in the invention of novel digital design technologies. In this paper Oxman proposed a new therm ‘Rapid Craft’. It describes a design protocol that combines material behavior and fabrication in the design of responsive skins.
and intuitive local knowledge of one’s own environment. Craft, in general, represents such an affinity between the maker and its immediate context, the environment, which is to contain the object of desire. As such, beyond its traditional description or meaning, craftsmanship may be reinterpreted as a set of instructions combining knowledge and application, matter and tools. An operational framework for processing and re-organizing material constructs. Thus, a craft of any kind may potentially serve as a guiding instruction-set, a formalism, which merges knowledge of application with an instrumentality of material organization.”
RAPID PROTOTYPING
INVESTIGATING INNOVATIONS IN THE MANUFACTURING INDUSTRY ANDHIGHLIGHTINGITSIMPACTON THE ARCHITECTURAL PRACTICE.
ahead our vision as designers with regards to efficient CAD/CAM/CAE processes and yet an opposite approach: “factory to file,” has never been considered. In other words, machine execution should not merely be regarded simply as a service tool for materializing design but rather an opportunity to inform the design process as one that integrates machine-logic across all scales of production. Material choice and fabrication methods are not innocent decisions, but are rather pre-determined factors which guide the design with respect to both artifact and process from start to finish.” […]
THE PROGRAMMED WALL
By Eline Degenaar - board - InDeSem’15 Fragments taken from the paper: Oxman, N. (2007). Rapid Craft. ACADIA
NERI OXMAN
RE. CRAFT INDE
RAPID CRAFT