Architectural Design Studio:
Air
Mengyan Zhang 521716 Studio 6
Part 1: Introduction
Hi, I’m Megan and this is my third year of university and my major is architecture. I’m from Shanghai, China and I’ve been in Australia for five years. I finished high school here. The life of university is a big challenge for me and I’m so suprised with amazing computer software after I choose this major. Why I choose architecture as my major because I’m interested in designing and exploring interesting things. I want to challenge new and excited things. I like both of classical and modern buildings, so I hope one day I can go to Europe and have a look those ancient and famous architecture. For me, I prefer modern architecture to ancient ones because I think modern architure means for the future and the world is walking towards the future under high technology buildings with computation. I love Shanghai as well as its buildings.
For the first year semester one, I start to use digital tool, Rhino and it’s quite new to me and I felt difficult working this tool, which can make 3D models. I met the problem in the step of fabrication, so the final model is not worked well. From that moment, I thought I need to improve my computer skills on digital tools and I knew that is key of creating more ideas for my design. Later, I’ve tried AutoCAD, Indesign and Photoshop as well and learnt basic skills. It is necessary to be familiar with these digital tools that may help developing my designs and presenting final works.
Part 2: Previous work
This is my final design in the subject of Virtual Environment and it’s not a successful design. However, I’ve learnt more about that digital tool and found that there is more space to discover by using the tool. A lot of amazing architectural buildings are created by it and human beings are so intelligent to use the tool to make the life wonderful and exciting.
Part 3: Architecture as a discourse
What’s architecture? Architecture is the most public of the arts. It is inescapable on a daily basis for anyone living in an urban society. The public role of works of architecture, not to mention their size and complexity, means that they can be fantastically expensive, and more than any other practice of visual culture they require public patronage.
Once Richard Williams described ‘architecture is as much a philosophical, social or professional realm as it is a material one, and it is through the consideration of architecture as discourse that one can engage with it as visual culture.‘ In my opinion,I agree that architecture is defined as art and it is considered in two ways, the understanding of its sign or symbol and spatial experience. Architecture is not just only buildings, it has life and it may reflect the culture background of a city. It is represented in a visual way to the public. In the past, huge sculptures are an evidence of significant phenomenon and it is also an visual language of culture. Now, buildings are created after considering several aspects such as materials, environments, social influences and so on. They are more focused on the visual effect to the public and the society.
Richard Williams, ‘Architecture and Visual Culture’, in Exploring Visual Culture : Definitions, Concepts, Contexts, ed. by Matthew Rampley (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2005), pp. 102 116.
Part 4: Precedent projects
SOM, TransBay Transit Centre competition, San Francisco, California, 2010
The collaboration between architects and engineers pushes the development and innovation in computational technologies. The spirit of architectural and engineering collaboration ffeds the development of conceptural and technical invention aat SOM, leading to new structural and architectural paradignms. Architects need to undestand how th overll shape of a building affects it structural nature, even without understanding the mathematics or algorithms. From traditional 2-D FE meshes to 3-D, it is an improvement from the research and experiments. The influence of FE algorithms and power of computers show that it is possible to evaluate a large number of designs in a short amount of time. TransBay Transit Centre is designed by the team SOM (Skidmore, Owings & Merrill), architects Keith Besserud and Neil Katz and structural engineer Alessandro Beghini, and will be built in San Francisco, California in 2010. Two primary research techniques SOM architects and engineers use are based on GAs (genetic algorithms) which are used for shape-optimisation exercise and gradient-based algorithms which are used for topologyoptimisation exercises. The lateral bracing schemes for this project is revealed in topology-optimisation exercise using gradient-based research algorithms.
FE algorithms
Structural Emergence
Designers get the idea from the teardrop shape and develop into a more conically tapered shape as the optimal form. The Michekk frame concept is similar with this building project profile. Michell frames are a family of minimum material solutions for a variety of load and support conditions composed of orthogonal fields of lines. Lines of principle stress as revealed in finite elements analysis models and echoed in Michell frame diagrams were expressed architecturally on the exteriors of the buildings. Michell frame
Deconstructivist Architecture The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York curated by Philip Johnson and Mark Wigley in 1988 is an typical example of decontructivist architecture, which posses the fragile veneer with untroubed and pure form. Grey Lynn thought thefuture of architecture would be ‘An Advanced Form of Movement’, which means the destabilisation of form in Desconstructivist objects is transposed to the prcess of making form itself. He also described architecture is the last refuge for members of the flat-earth club and it is significantly suggested that human beings need to participate in the flows and forces that are shaping and reshaping the built environment. While designing the building, it is neseccary to consider the site and architecture participates within a larger urban situation through art historical lens.
Diagram of architectural composition: contemporary logic of architectural composition
The Museum of Modern Art is designed through observing the surrounding environment,which is an urban situation. The building using simple geometry, mainly rectangle, to represent the modern atmosphere and architecture. The building with landscape designing gives the life of this city and open space with sculptures also combines the art of urban city and built natural environment that forms the constrast as well. It is a very clever design and the building is obviousl observed from the sky and spatial aspect is well considered by using geometries. Open space is functional and interrelated with other parts of the building.
Part 5: Algorithm challenge
Option 2: Mesh Triangulation Algorithm
Part 5: Algorithm challenge
Option 2: Mesh Triangulation Algorithm