Thursday, October 8, 2009
New Photos on the Onion Pinch
Onion Pinch is a cork installation that covers an area of 6 per 7 meters (42 square metres), it was exposed in the Lisbon subway station of Cais do Sodre and in the international fair on Composite Materials Compotec.
Monday, September 28, 2009
AUM STUDIO ED KELLER + CARLA LEITÃO (DIGITAL RESEARCH PRACTICE)
Studio description
AUM Studio [www.aumstudio.org] is an award winning architecture, new media and design research firm founded by Ed Keller and Carla Leitão.
AUM Studio designs a diverse range of environments and ambiances that integrate new media art projects, urban interactivity and smart surfacing of private and public spaces.
The work encompasses residential, institutional, and commercial architecture projects, to game design / multimedia / highdef digital video projects, art direction, and speculative geopolitical futurism. AUM Studio focuses on enhanced urban spaces and landmarks, new forms of media relationship to site and new forms of content and materiality in the context of the renewed agility of contemporary cities. The firm’s unique position merges a hands-on approach to the production of multimedia environments with a deep knowledge of architectural and artistic fields and practices. We provide insight on interactivity as applied to urban spaces and in general ubiquitous environments realized through the blend of diverse technologies, skill sets and disciplines of thought. We work in direct collaboration with fields such as computer science, computer graphics, landscape, material sciences, robotics, urban design, product design, and ecommerce.
AUM Studio's recent work includes residential/institutional/commercial projects and new media installations in Europe and the US (current ongoing projects include Lodi Library, NY); the interactive cinema installation ‘SUTURE' at SCIArc and TELIC galleries in Los Angeles; script, concept and design work for ORNAMENT, an online massively multiplayer game/film/graphic novel; and urban design and architecture competitions such as the MAK Center Vertical Garden [invited]; Turku Finland; UIA Celebration of Cities [National Award]; House for Andrei Tarkovsky [first prize]; and Museum for Nam June Paik. They participated in the 2004 Beijing Biennale NY Hotspot event with their installation 'Time Flow Control'. AUM Studio’s work was featured in the AD magazine issue on “Collective Intelligence” in 2007.
Both Keller and Leitão develop research projects in academia through design studios and seminars that focus on the role of new media and ubiquity in architecture, material, urban landscapes and geopolitics.
Statement on Digital Primitive
Geometry as a discipline has always addressed both mathematical and philosophical agendas. Our work uses both these lines as modes of thinking: searching though pattern for ways to build platforms for multiple species – biological, abstract, symbolic, digital.
Techniques for exploring continuity can discover or create new webs for dreams that live juxtaposed in reality – and in pattern verify the birth of new types. Algorithms obsessed with continuity are then confronted with the limits of smoothness.
These concepts relate to preoccupations with the apparent 'life' of forms in art, as well as to geometry's ability to control or connect with deeper forces through immanent diagrams of organization. Our use of formal techniques in our work is roughly analogous to the function of the axiom within an overall formal system.
When we design for a city, we de-focus the condition of building and design fogs, as these are more often able to install new territories, readings and action. New grids are installed in a counter-time to the conventional and centralizing rhythms of the city – moments where centrality and marginality can merge.
As a consequence of the romances between matter, the blackmailing between infrastructures and the “measuring-up” between protocols, moments or scales have to be found such that all gestures become urban and create a new temporal dimension for the soap opera of the infinite narratives of everyday life.
More patterns remain to be made- from direction to desire, mutual perception and embrace. Houses act as geologies with multiple corners, circular, for eternal ricochet, and deposit scales of familiar gestures, rhythms of collectives in the individual, repetitions of the individual in the common. The arcades of the future have been rehearsed but the gesture is still and forever to be defined.
Project 1: MAK COMPETITION
Location: SCHINDLER HOUSE, LOS ANGELES, CA
Date: 2006
Client: INVITED COMPETITION, MAK CENTER
Digital tools:
ILLUSTRATOR, GENERATIVE COMPONENTS, RHINO, RHINO SCRIPT, SURFACE EVOLVER, MAYA, PHOTOSHOP, SONY HDRHC1, FINAL CUT PRO, MPEG STREAMCLIP, QUICKTIME PRO, AUDACITY
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
AUTHOR: AUM STUDIO [KELLER & LEITÃO]
NEW YORK [DESIGN TEAM]:
_DAVE PIGRAM_EZIO BLASETTI_ROLAND SNOOKS
LOS ANGELES [SITE RESEARCH]:
_DANIEL VASINI_EMILIANO ESPASANDIN
LISBON [LANDSCAPE AND ENGINEERING]:
_CLAUDIA SISTI
_VALDEMAR LEITAO
AUM Studio [www.aumstudio.org] is an award winning architecture, new media and design research firm founded by Ed Keller and Carla Leitão.
AUM Studio designs a diverse range of environments and ambiances that integrate new media art projects, urban interactivity and smart surfacing of private and public spaces.
The work encompasses residential, institutional, and commercial architecture projects, to game design / multimedia / highdef digital video projects, art direction, and speculative geopolitical futurism. AUM Studio focuses on enhanced urban spaces and landmarks, new forms of media relationship to site and new forms of content and materiality in the context of the renewed agility of contemporary cities. The firm’s unique position merges a hands-on approach to the production of multimedia environments with a deep knowledge of architectural and artistic fields and practices. We provide insight on interactivity as applied to urban spaces and in general ubiquitous environments realized through the blend of diverse technologies, skill sets and disciplines of thought. We work in direct collaboration with fields such as computer science, computer graphics, landscape, material sciences, robotics, urban design, product design, and ecommerce.
AUM Studio's recent work includes residential/institutional/commercial projects and new media installations in Europe and the US (current ongoing projects include Lodi Library, NY); the interactive cinema installation ‘SUTURE' at SCIArc and TELIC galleries in Los Angeles; script, concept and design work for ORNAMENT, an online massively multiplayer game/film/graphic novel; and urban design and architecture competitions such as the MAK Center Vertical Garden [invited]; Turku Finland; UIA Celebration of Cities [National Award]; House for Andrei Tarkovsky [first prize]; and Museum for Nam June Paik. They participated in the 2004 Beijing Biennale NY Hotspot event with their installation 'Time Flow Control'. AUM Studio’s work was featured in the AD magazine issue on “Collective Intelligence” in 2007.
Both Keller and Leitão develop research projects in academia through design studios and seminars that focus on the role of new media and ubiquity in architecture, material, urban landscapes and geopolitics.
Statement on Digital Primitive
Geometry as a discipline has always addressed both mathematical and philosophical agendas. Our work uses both these lines as modes of thinking: searching though pattern for ways to build platforms for multiple species – biological, abstract, symbolic, digital.
Techniques for exploring continuity can discover or create new webs for dreams that live juxtaposed in reality – and in pattern verify the birth of new types. Algorithms obsessed with continuity are then confronted with the limits of smoothness.
These concepts relate to preoccupations with the apparent 'life' of forms in art, as well as to geometry's ability to control or connect with deeper forces through immanent diagrams of organization. Our use of formal techniques in our work is roughly analogous to the function of the axiom within an overall formal system.
When we design for a city, we de-focus the condition of building and design fogs, as these are more often able to install new territories, readings and action. New grids are installed in a counter-time to the conventional and centralizing rhythms of the city – moments where centrality and marginality can merge.
As a consequence of the romances between matter, the blackmailing between infrastructures and the “measuring-up” between protocols, moments or scales have to be found such that all gestures become urban and create a new temporal dimension for the soap opera of the infinite narratives of everyday life.
More patterns remain to be made- from direction to desire, mutual perception and embrace. Houses act as geologies with multiple corners, circular, for eternal ricochet, and deposit scales of familiar gestures, rhythms of collectives in the individual, repetitions of the individual in the common. The arcades of the future have been rehearsed but the gesture is still and forever to be defined.
Project 1: MAK COMPETITION
Location: SCHINDLER HOUSE, LOS ANGELES, CA
Date: 2006
Client: INVITED COMPETITION, MAK CENTER
Digital tools:
ILLUSTRATOR, GENERATIVE COMPONENTS, RHINO, RHINO SCRIPT, SURFACE EVOLVER, MAYA, PHOTOSHOP, SONY HDRHC1, FINAL CUT PRO, MPEG STREAMCLIP, QUICKTIME PRO, AUDACITY
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
AUTHOR: AUM STUDIO [KELLER & LEITÃO]
NEW YORK [DESIGN TEAM]:
_DAVE PIGRAM_EZIO BLASETTI_ROLAND SNOOKS
LOS ANGELES [SITE RESEARCH]:
_DANIEL VASINI_EMILIANO ESPASANDIN
LISBON [LANDSCAPE AND ENGINEERING]:
_CLAUDIA SISTI
_VALDEMAR LEITAO
Description
In the MAK project, a proposal for a vertical urban garden, tiling patterns were studied to generate certain kinds of luminous density and layers of opacity. These patterns had rules for proximity, blending, and scaling.
The site was mapped as a set of fields delineated lines of sight, light intensity, points of dry or moist growth; scripts in Maya and GC then deployed tiling geometry across the site within an envelope of iteration.
These scripts morphed between triangular and hexagonal geometry, and iterated the panels in varying density according to our mapping studies.
The tile system, to be fabricated out of sand blasted glass panels, functions as overlapping screens for community curated video projection and art installations at the Schindler house; as well they function to direct light and views on the site, and to mediate between the Schindler site and its neighbor sites.
The tiles function morphologically as the organizing system and generative edges for a minimal thin concrete wall that connects all the tiles, functions as structure, and is a substrate for the vertical garden. Surface Evolver was used to develop this continuous minimal surface, and the topology of this surface was adjusted according to proximity to the new building to the south, as well as the plant types and light conditions the project creates on the Schindler site.
We understood the plants as a neural network in the site- a fragile/flexible intelligence. To deploy the garden across the minimal surface, a Rhino script was used to analyze the geometry of the minimal surface structure; working with our landscape consultant, this script determined the plant species that would best adhere to the different angles and light conditions.
Every system- living or nonorganic- generates its own spatiotemporal field, which includes its thresholds of engagement with the landscape. In our project, the plants merge with the wall itself, and metamorphose not only the husk of the Schindler house, but reach out into Los Angeles as well. Los Angeles' time plane will become non-relative, as this autonomous, trans-temporal act of architecture meets the organic life and media systems as a crucible we are propose for the site. The project plays with a set of formal axioms at the molecular as well as the macroscale in the city to reinvent the fabric and landscape of imagination.
Project 2: SUTURE INSTALLATION
Location: LOS ANGELES, CA
Date: 2005-06
Client: SCIARC AND TELIC GALLERIES
Digital tools:
MAYA, AUTOCAD, PHOTOSHOP, ILLUSTRATOR, SONY HDRHC1, FINAL CUT PRO, MPEG STREAMCLIP, QUICKTIME PRO, AUDACITY, NATIVE INSTRUMENTS REAKTOR, MAXMSP/JITTER, EOWAVE, MIDI USB HARDWARE, 3 MAC OSX DESKTOPS, 3 HIDEF VIDEO PROJECTORS, BEHRINGER AUDIO MONITORS, INTERNET CONNECTION BETWEEN GALLERIES.
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
AUTHOR: AUM STUDIO [KELLER & LEITÃO] WITH
GEORGE SHOWMAN [PROGRAMMING AND TECHNOLOGY]
BRIAN FLAIG [PROJECT COORDINATION
AND OBJECT DESIGN] DESIGN/ FABRICATION: INSTALLATION
FURNITURE PIECES FABRICATED IN
SCIARC MILLING SHOP
Description
In SUTURE, an interactive multimedia installation, we suggested that a collective intelligence could emerge as a kind of agency distributed locally onto the participants in each gallery. Conceptually, we were interested in reconfiguring the concept of ‘suture’, a key term in film theory, in order to propose a new cinematic & architectural body created through the visitors' interactive editing of event, gesture and materiality. Instead of the semiotic framework the concept of 'suture' emerged from [See Kaja Silverman, The Subject of Semiotics (New York, 1983)] we presented an interface to manifest it purely
through space, gesture, material, and cinematic-haptic fields. We redeployed responsibility for cinematic edits onto visitors as they moved in the spaces and triggered a cascading series of remixes and overlaps of gesture and material footage. The rules were established as a framework to permit a range of edits to take place; categories of homogenous, singular, or aggregate materials, and closeup, medium, and longshot gestures were mixed according to different degrees of acceleration, creating
inversions of the original sources, and switching the regularity of the space and time orientation. Instead of analysing footage for meaning, we relied entirely on the 'sense' built into each shot to develop rules for classifying and remixing.
Gestures and materials go beyond the human scale and encompass urban situations, infrastructure, and landscape. Desert spaces, transit spaces, and more distant abstract points of view- such as satellite orbits over the earth- established another scale in the footage. SUTURE proposed a way of working with collective intelligence [both the groups of people interacting with the project, but also the 'arrays of media' as autonomous, ruledriven bodies in the network itself ] such that the potential of different users and site interactions became responsible for actively renewing key concepts of ambience and environment. The installation placed each visitor in a position of agency to realize radical new scales and blends of gesture, material and situation.
It becomes necessary to create new situations, devices, machines or organisms that advance our ability to render visible this individuality within the collective: a key ingredient of a fruitful enrichment in both cultural and human terms.
A grid made of different nodal points is placed over the city. New points are discovered in the middle areas between the points of great visibility - of one temporal understanding of the city – and the opposite temporal points; those individuals who reveal a profound distance between the sense of locality, and the insufficient recognition of their individuality by the urban nucleus.
The nodes are spaces of night life – present in the urban dream – they are anchoring points for passage of individuals in a limit situation, when the capacity of self-expression is lost inside the urban context. The visibility given by the proposed structures announces a situation of play, of stage, of rehearsal, of temporary exercise of wills and desires, while simultaneously being devoted to the service of showing and caring for that same self-expression of others. The structures go from uncharacterised points to bright spaces of invention: exhibition galleries of diverse themes, experimentation places, meeting points. These nodes will start to bind themselves to their intelligent behavior, that is, the way in which they construct themselves on a local level and then invent new articulations of their situation in this network.
Project 3: UIA URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION
Location: LISBON, PORTUGAL
Date: 2003
Client: UIA
Digital tools: 3D STUDIO, ILLUSTRATOR, PHOTOSHOP, AUTOCAD
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
AUTHOR: AUM STUDIO (KELLER&LEITAO) WITH
MARTA CALDEIRA
COLLABORATOR: CATERINA TIAZZOLDI
Description
Cities should be nothing more or less than the great range of density of human desires, which are able to provoke constant creativity in others.
A healthy city – an ideal agglomeration – is a condition born and developed through both the concrete and imaginary inventions of its inhabitants. All the participating agents in a city are immediate beneficiaries
of its evolution and answer to time. In the same way, each contribution is unique and indispensable in the process of imagining ongoing change.
Cities have several temporal ranges, areas of history that appear and disappear, dissipating in the structures which materialize as temporary or permanent wills. One of the most pertinent capacities in an urban nucleus resides in some of these non-permanent structures: that of the self-modification of meaning, that of the intelligent material.
The accommodation of activities made by the city does not summarize the city in itself: neither does it do justice to its complex body nor to its intelligent answer to time.A syndrome of disease in a city is evidenced – taking different forms – when the main role of individual agent inside a collectivity is not allowed to its citizens. Examples may be found in all the conditions that emphasize only unilateral or dual understanding of the surrounding environment. The concept of marginality, for instance, is foreign, yet nevertheless accepted in an urban mode of thought which is inclusive and by nature is engaged with the reconceptualization of city edges. This discussion of limits evokes not only what is exterior to the self but also the integral internal elements of the city body.
BENAMOR DUARTE ARCHITECTURE – (DESIGN PRACTICE)
Studio description
Benamor Duarte Architecture’s work engage the ideas of recursion, adaptation and reconstitution of formal, informal and informational protocols in different contexts. The studio’s projects have been using the bi-dimensional transposition technique as a way to explore and investigate the prefiguration of his design concepts. This method aims to develop the idea of adaptation and scale by transposing the registers of the figurative and geometry drawing techniques to the materiality of a furniture piece, a landscape or a building.
The studio was found in New York by Eduardo Benamor Duarte where in addition to his professional practice he has collaborates with several academic institutions while, he is currently design studios at the California College of the Arts.
Statement on Digital Primitive
Starting from its etymological meaning, we’ll find that the association of the two words implies the coexistence of two different realities.
Digital, implies a code providing information to attribute meaning or action to a function; and Primitive, constrains each function to a reduced set of properties.
Once articulated, these two words create an unlimited set of interdependent tools that generate multiple design solutions. Nevertheless in every Digital solution, the limitations of its variations become restricted to the reduce set of properties offered by the Primitive condition. In this case its ultimate variation can only be achieved if linked to a process of repetition.
Project 1: Rapigattoli chair
Location: Product
Date: April 2008
Client: Limited edition for Zero2
Digital tool: Rhino 4.0
Author:
Eduardo Benamor Duarte with Caterina Tiazzoldi and visualization by Lorenza Croce
Design/ fabrication
Tietz & Baccon, LLC
Description
The Rapigattoli chair is an original prototype aiming to investigate the idea of adaptation and scale by transposing on the registers of the figurative and geometry drawing techniques on the materiality of a chair.
Originally, generated from a single profile configuration encasing the seat and back, the primal profile is arrayed along the perimeter of a circumference creating the necessary surface for use. Two legs are added strategically by mirroring the first profile 45 cm above the floor. The Rapigattoli chair is built in ¾ inch birch plywood generating a wood flexion and rib structure to enhance the chair softness and lightness while changing the framing of the surrounding space: A new type of transparency is constantly created while the perception of amount of surface material is permanently altered.
The accumulation and transformation of the same rib profile is processed through a set of iterations processed with computer numeric control (CNC) pantograph transforming the rough birch plywood of the Rapigattoli Chair in a design piece.
Project 2: Coney Island Parachute Pavilion
Location: Coney Island, New York
Date: April, 2005
Client: Van Alen Institute - Open competition
Digital tools: Maya 6.0
Author: Eduardo Benamor Duarte
Design/ fabrication : CNC Laser cutter 
Description
Pattern spectacle
The site of the project is surrounded by a public landscape of leisure in an attraction park. The brief emphasizes the need for a physical relationship with the adjacent boardwalk and the historical parachute infrastructure. The Program area for the pavilion is laid into a new foil providing a filter to the major pedestrian fluxes in the site Its drawn as an artificial structural landscape of slopes coiled around two distinctive tunnels: One facing the top of the pachute jumping platform; another facing the ocean.
Pattern landscape.
The program is configured along a directional orientation knot drawn according to three major per formative principles: spreading; connectivity and aggregation.
These three principles are based on typological convergences, topographical restrictions and data densities. The resulting mass emphasizes the interdependency between each function while regulating the inflection and deformation of the pavilion’s perimeter.
Pattern recognition
The building skin is configured by replicating the geometry of the Parachute structure, recreating the daily performance of the user in the inside space, configuring alternative patterns of living. The shop and exhibition space are divided in zones that overlap topographies of enclosure and open air, in intervals of space between structural steel and concrete slopes.
Project 3: Europan 7 – International housing Competition 2004
Location: Budapest
Date: June 2003
Client: EUROPAN 7 - Open Competition
Digital tools: Maya 6.0
Author: Eduardo Benamor Duarte 
Description
Domestic Landscapes
The site of the project is a mixed environment of a public landscape and industrial surroundings. The Program area is laid into a new ground providing the major core for urban activities.
Its drawn as an artificial landscape of slopes with different heights and inclination offering a multitude of scales and performances.
The necessary infrastructure for the housing program is covered with slopes containing parking
Block landscape.
The housing blocks are configured along directional East West orientations drawn according to three major patterns: spreading; connectivity and aggregation.
These three principles are based on typological convergences, topographical restrictions and data densities. The resulting block is a mixed-use fluid confining and merging different types, housing services and voids. Its interdependency regulates the inflection and deformation of the block perimeter.
Structural landscape
The construction of the site is processed with the development of structural steel frame of ribs that outline the form and skin of the blocks.
In order to achieve a notorious fusion with the environmental landscape the skin of the blocks is filled with a large percentage of translucent and transparent panels enhancing the structure’s lightness and clearance.
Apartment LandscapeThe apartment are configured according to the daily performance of the user in the inside space, configuring alternative patterns of living. The apartments are divided in zones that overlap topographies of residencies and services, in intervals of space between structural steel and concrete slopes.
Benamor Duarte Architecture’s work engage the ideas of recursion, adaptation and reconstitution of formal, informal and informational protocols in different contexts. The studio’s projects have been using the bi-dimensional transposition technique as a way to explore and investigate the prefiguration of his design concepts. This method aims to develop the idea of adaptation and scale by transposing the registers of the figurative and geometry drawing techniques to the materiality of a furniture piece, a landscape or a building.
The studio was found in New York by Eduardo Benamor Duarte where in addition to his professional practice he has collaborates with several academic institutions while, he is currently design studios at the California College of the Arts.
Statement on Digital Primitive
Starting from its etymological meaning, we’ll find that the association of the two words implies the coexistence of two different realities.
Digital, implies a code providing information to attribute meaning or action to a function; and Primitive, constrains each function to a reduced set of properties.
Once articulated, these two words create an unlimited set of interdependent tools that generate multiple design solutions. Nevertheless in every Digital solution, the limitations of its variations become restricted to the reduce set of properties offered by the Primitive condition. In this case its ultimate variation can only be achieved if linked to a process of repetition.
Project 1: Rapigattoli chair
Location: Product
Date: April 2008
Client: Limited edition for Zero2
Digital tool: Rhino 4.0
Author:
Eduardo Benamor Duarte with Caterina Tiazzoldi and visualization by Lorenza Croce
Design/ fabrication
Tietz & Baccon, LLC
Description
The Rapigattoli chair is an original prototype aiming to investigate the idea of adaptation and scale by transposing on the registers of the figurative and geometry drawing techniques on the materiality of a chair.
Originally, generated from a single profile configuration encasing the seat and back, the primal profile is arrayed along the perimeter of a circumference creating the necessary surface for use. Two legs are added strategically by mirroring the first profile 45 cm above the floor. The Rapigattoli chair is built in ¾ inch birch plywood generating a wood flexion and rib structure to enhance the chair softness and lightness while changing the framing of the surrounding space: A new type of transparency is constantly created while the perception of amount of surface material is permanently altered.
The accumulation and transformation of the same rib profile is processed through a set of iterations processed with computer numeric control (CNC) pantograph transforming the rough birch plywood of the Rapigattoli Chair in a design piece.
Project 2: Coney Island Parachute Pavilion
Location: Coney Island, New York
Date: April, 2005
Client: Van Alen Institute - Open competition
Digital tools: Maya 6.0
Author: Eduardo Benamor Duarte
Design/ fabrication : CNC Laser cutter
Description
Pattern spectacle
The site of the project is surrounded by a public landscape of leisure in an attraction park. The brief emphasizes the need for a physical relationship with the adjacent boardwalk and the historical parachute infrastructure. The Program area for the pavilion is laid into a new foil providing a filter to the major pedestrian fluxes in the site Its drawn as an artificial structural landscape of slopes coiled around two distinctive tunnels: One facing the top of the pachute jumping platform; another facing the ocean.
Pattern landscape.
The program is configured along a directional orientation knot drawn according to three major per formative principles: spreading; connectivity and aggregation.
These three principles are based on typological convergences, topographical restrictions and data densities. The resulting mass emphasizes the interdependency between each function while regulating the inflection and deformation of the pavilion’s perimeter.
Pattern recognition
The building skin is configured by replicating the geometry of the Parachute structure, recreating the daily performance of the user in the inside space, configuring alternative patterns of living. The shop and exhibition space are divided in zones that overlap topographies of enclosure and open air, in intervals of space between structural steel and concrete slopes.
Project 3: Europan 7 – International housing Competition 2004
Location: Budapest
Date: June 2003
Client: EUROPAN 7 - Open Competition
Digital tools: Maya 6.0
Author: Eduardo Benamor Duarte
Description
Domestic Landscapes
The site of the project is a mixed environment of a public landscape and industrial surroundings. The Program area is laid into a new ground providing the major core for urban activities.
Its drawn as an artificial landscape of slopes with different heights and inclination offering a multitude of scales and performances.
The necessary infrastructure for the housing program is covered with slopes containing parking
Block landscape.
The housing blocks are configured along directional East West orientations drawn according to three major patterns: spreading; connectivity and aggregation.
These three principles are based on typological convergences, topographical restrictions and data densities. The resulting block is a mixed-use fluid confining and merging different types, housing services and voids. Its interdependency regulates the inflection and deformation of the block perimeter.
Structural landscape
The construction of the site is processed with the development of structural steel frame of ribs that outline the form and skin of the blocks.
In order to achieve a notorious fusion with the environmental landscape the skin of the blocks is filled with a large percentage of translucent and transparent panels enhancing the structure’s lightness and clearance.
Apartment LandscapeThe apartment are configured according to the daily performance of the user in the inside space, configuring alternative patterns of living. The apartments are divided in zones that overlap topographies of residencies and services, in intervals of space between structural steel and concrete slopes.
GSAPP COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY / AVERY DIGITAL FABICATION LAB – (ACADEMIC RESEARCH)
Studio description
The shift toward more expansive forms of digital production within the design and construction industry affords opportunities of not only reconfiguring the relationships between the key players, but also incorporating industry sectors not typically associated with building construction. At the core of this shift is the integration of communication through various forms of digital networks, CNC fabrication being just one among many, with the ambition of developing a comprehensive, well organized, easily accessible, and parametrically adaptable body of information that coordinates the process from design through a building’s lifecycle. This is the broader context for the goals of the Avery Digital Fabrication Lab.
Statement on Digital Primitive
What distinguishes CNC technologies for architecture is the opportunity it affords to reposition design strategically within fabrication and construction processes such that what architects actually produce—drawings—shifts from loose representations of buildings to highly precise sets of instructions that are coordinated and integrated into a full description of a building. At a more modest level within this comprehensive organizational picture, CNC has also influenced design methodologies as architects begin to respond more directly to the conditions of digital production as a means for both pragmatic concerns like cost and efficiency and more conceptual potentials like variability and customization. These are the topics of research and experimentation for the lab.
Project 1: AMPHORAE
Location: COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
Date: SPRING 2007 / FALL 2008
Client: COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, LAFARGE
Digital tools:
3-D MODELING, CNC FABRICATION
Credits: Design/ fabrication / Implementation
MARK BEARAK, DORA KELLE, ADAM MERCIER, PHILLIP ANZALONE
Description:
Framing Space was an installation designed and constructed for the AIA-NY Center for Architecture “Make It Work: Engineering Possibilities exhibition. The installation was a collaborative between two Architecture Schools (GSAPP and Pratt), an architecture firm (Atelier Architecture 64) and a number of sponsors with a goal for education and demonstration of structural and design possibilities through the use of new materials, processes and design techniques. The Framing Space exhibition piece seeks to explore the relationship between craft, in its simultaneous traditional and constructive connotations, and contemporary methods of architectural construction. This study is done through the filter of material qualities, decoration, assembly details and other technical constructive means. The resulting installation evokes and engages with the human through optical, textural and conceptual qualities to bring to the surface the juxtaposition and potentials inherent in the joining of the old and the new. The Trusset Structural System used in this construction was invented by Phillip Anzalone and Cory Clarke.
Project 3: SLIDE LIBRARY
Location: DEPARTMENT OF ART AND ARCHAEOLOGY
Date: 2005
Client: COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
Digital tools:
3-D MODELING, CNC FABRICATION
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
MARBLE FAIRBANKS /COLUMBIA GSAPP STUDENT TEAM
Description
This project was completed both as a prototype research project to test computerized fabrication techniques, and to fulfill the immediate program needs of the client as the first phase of a longer-term master plan. The design consists of four walls defining the space of the slide library and lit by the skylight above.
The east wall is made up of 435 sandwiched layers of 1” thick ultralight (lightweight mdf). Occasional viewing portals are formed by carved layers on opposite sides of the wall where two 1/2” thick glass panels are inserted. The middle of the east wall curves into the space to capture light in the hall outside from a skylight above. The edges of the glass panels refract and glow from natural light. The north, south and west walls are patterned with 1/4” perforated lines outlining the actual tooling paths for each of the layers of the east wall – these lines are illuminated by the light of the skylight in the slide library. As part of the rigor to digitally draw, fabricate and manage the entire project, every component of the design was milled regardless of its complexity to enable thewalls to be assembled like furniture.
The shift toward more expansive forms of digital production within the design and construction industry affords opportunities of not only reconfiguring the relationships between the key players, but also incorporating industry sectors not typically associated with building construction. At the core of this shift is the integration of communication through various forms of digital networks, CNC fabrication being just one among many, with the ambition of developing a comprehensive, well organized, easily accessible, and parametrically adaptable body of information that coordinates the process from design through a building’s lifecycle. This is the broader context for the goals of the Avery Digital Fabrication Lab.
Statement on Digital Primitive
What distinguishes CNC technologies for architecture is the opportunity it affords to reposition design strategically within fabrication and construction processes such that what architects actually produce—drawings—shifts from loose representations of buildings to highly precise sets of instructions that are coordinated and integrated into a full description of a building. At a more modest level within this comprehensive organizational picture, CNC has also influenced design methodologies as architects begin to respond more directly to the conditions of digital production as a means for both pragmatic concerns like cost and efficiency and more conceptual potentials like variability and customization. These are the topics of research and experimentation for the lab.
Project 1: AMPHORAE
Location: COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
Date: SPRING 2007 / FALL 2008
Client: COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, LAFARGE
Digital tools:
3-D MODELING, CNC FABRICATION
Credits: Design/ fabrication / Implementation
MARK BEARAK, DORA KELLE, ADAM MERCIER, PHILLIP ANZALONE
Description
Amphorae is a collection of various objects with differing sizes and functions ranging from small bricks to full pieces of furniture, which are tied together functionally and aesthetically. Our elements range in size and level of detailing based on function. We created a system of ecologically sensitive concrete elements that can be used for the collection, filtration and redistribution of water. These units not only hold water, but they also have smaller pockets with space to grow various forms of plant life that are fed by the individual cisterns.
The project is meant to be far more than simply a structural wall; it is a vertical garden that can be reconfigured and installed anywhere.
The Amphorae elements are constructed from Ductal concrete. Our mixture is composed of recycled sand and reconstituted fly ash as a bonding agent. This mixture reduces carbon emissions by more than 30% when compared to standard concrete. The project goes beyond representation; from concept through execution decisions were made with the environment in mind.
Project 2: FRAMING SPACE
Location: AIA NEW YORK CENTER FOR ART AND ARCHITECTURE
Date: JANUARY 2009
Client: AIA NEW YORK CENTER FOR ART AND ARCHITECTURE
Digital tools:
3-D MODELING, CNC FABRICATION
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
PHILLIP ANZALONE AND STEPHANIE BAYARD OF ATELIER ARCHITECTURE 64, GSAPP/PRATT INSTITUTE STUDENT TEAM
Description:
Framing Space was an installation designed and constructed for the AIA-NY Center for Architecture “Make It Work: Engineering Possibilities exhibition. The installation was a collaborative between two Architecture Schools (GSAPP and Pratt), an architecture firm (Atelier Architecture 64) and a number of sponsors with a goal for education and demonstration of structural and design possibilities through the use of new materials, processes and design techniques. The Framing Space exhibition piece seeks to explore the relationship between craft, in its simultaneous traditional and constructive connotations, and contemporary methods of architectural construction. This study is done through the filter of material qualities, decoration, assembly details and other technical constructive means. The resulting installation evokes and engages with the human through optical, textural and conceptual qualities to bring to the surface the juxtaposition and potentials inherent in the joining of the old and the new. The Trusset Structural System used in this construction was invented by Phillip Anzalone and Cory Clarke.
Project 3: SLIDE LIBRARY
Location: DEPARTMENT OF ART AND ARCHAEOLOGY
Date: 2005
Client: COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
Digital tools:
3-D MODELING, CNC FABRICATION
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
MARBLE FAIRBANKS /COLUMBIA GSAPP STUDENT TEAM
Description
This project was completed both as a prototype research project to test computerized fabrication techniques, and to fulfill the immediate program needs of the client as the first phase of a longer-term master plan. The design consists of four walls defining the space of the slide library and lit by the skylight above.
The east wall is made up of 435 sandwiched layers of 1” thick ultralight (lightweight mdf). Occasional viewing portals are formed by carved layers on opposite sides of the wall where two 1/2” thick glass panels are inserted. The middle of the east wall curves into the space to capture light in the hall outside from a skylight above. The edges of the glass panels refract and glow from natural light. The north, south and west walls are patterned with 1/4” perforated lines outlining the actual tooling paths for each of the layers of the east wall – these lines are illuminated by the light of the skylight in the slide library. As part of the rigor to digitally draw, fabricate and manage the entire project, every component of the design was milled regardless of its complexity to enable thewalls to be assembled like furniture.
PETER MACAPIA labDORA (DIGITAL RESEARCH PRACTICE)
Studio description
Peter Macapia is the director and founder of labDORA, an interdisciplinary research office that focuses on design, the geometry and topology of matter/energy relations, and the advent of the algorithm. Each year the explores these problems through both material and computational work focusing on new tectonic and spatial problems.
Statement on Digital Primitive
There is a story in Plato about the cave – it suggests the problem of matter, of perception, of illusion. Descartes rewrote the story from the point of view of observing a piece of wax. The tendency towards a Royal science we all know is based on the notion that there is, that there exists, a foundation. And that the foundation can explain everything else that needs to be explained. But actually that knowledge is the constant product of the invention of problems that can never be seen or anticipated by the foundation. Even Leibniz knew this when he wrote about the calculus as having a limit, and that the limit was like these monstrous little species that might emerge. There’s nothing primitive about these kinds of problems: what is a geometrical logic, what is a topological one, and what is an algorithmic logic. I tend to see the interest in manipulating the signs according to a new paradigm, to quote Wittgenstein. The fabrication part is the most difficult of these investigations. The nonlinear behavior of material organization always forces a revision.
Project 1: FRINGE PAVILION STUDIES
Location: MANHATTAN
Date: 2009
Client: STUDY
Digital tools: NESTLIST ALGORITHM
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
PETER MACAPIA WITH MAT HOWARD
Peter Macapia is the director and founder of labDORA, an interdisciplinary research office that focuses on design, the geometry and topology of matter/energy relations, and the advent of the algorithm. Each year the explores these problems through both material and computational work focusing on new tectonic and spatial problems.
Statement on Digital Primitive
There is a story in Plato about the cave – it suggests the problem of matter, of perception, of illusion. Descartes rewrote the story from the point of view of observing a piece of wax. The tendency towards a Royal science we all know is based on the notion that there is, that there exists, a foundation. And that the foundation can explain everything else that needs to be explained. But actually that knowledge is the constant product of the invention of problems that can never be seen or anticipated by the foundation. Even Leibniz knew this when he wrote about the calculus as having a limit, and that the limit was like these monstrous little species that might emerge. There’s nothing primitive about these kinds of problems: what is a geometrical logic, what is a topological one, and what is an algorithmic logic. I tend to see the interest in manipulating the signs according to a new paradigm, to quote Wittgenstein. The fabrication part is the most difficult of these investigations. The nonlinear behavior of material organization always forces a revision.
Project 1: FRINGE PAVILION STUDIES
Location: MANHATTAN
Date: 2009
Client: STUDY
Digital tools: NESTLIST ALGORITHM
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
PETER MACAPIA WITH MAT HOWARD
Description
Developed out of a series of nestlist algorithms with the help of Mat Howard.
The problem set involved finding a way to generate geometrical system without using geometry. Absurd in a sense. But insofar as mathematical operations can be carried out by simple algorithmic rules it seemed necessary to question whether geometrical outputs had to be based on geometrical operations - only.
The function is one of simply sending a product back into an initial equation where the results will continuously vary. The numerical sequence then produces a topological network that is graphed spatially through spring mechanics.
As a result certain points generate further points with more or less density in 3space. the design use of this system doesn't have an apriori intelligence. What became significant is the translation of this system from the domain of a spatial network into a tectonic logic. In that sense it follows the research on urban pavilions for looking a new ways to develop designs that work with exiting conditions (like vacant lots) without relying on typical notions of mass and enclosure.
Project 2: GROSS TOPOLOGY: MANURUGLY TOWER
Location: MANHATTAN
Date: 2030
Client: MANUARUGLY
Digital tools: CELLULAR AUTOMATA AND TOPOLOGICAL NETWORK ALGORITHM
Credits: Design/ fabrication / Implementation
PETER MACAPIA WITH MAT HOWARD
Description:
The basis for my research in this project was to look at the problem of design from the point of view of computation and algorithm. If topology (rather than geometry) can shift the way in which we think of the spatiallity of the tower, then we ought to consider how that problem might manifest itself at the level of structure. And so the investigation looked at the problem of structure as topological rather than geometrical starting point. Gross means essentially two thing: first it is a lower dimension topological problem, that is, it deals with things like 2- and 3-space and second it works from a generalized (schematic) notion of space as manifold. Topology as such deals with ways of distinguishing manifolds. Differential topology deals with non-metrical notions of manifolds while differential geometry deals with metrical notions of manifolds. But a manifold as such is a topological space with local Euclidean characteristics. The general operation of the system is a lightweight structure in which the Primary and Secondary structures are combined not through direct contact but rather through a kind of inflatable splint. This third element is the programmatic space of the “pods.” The pods are assembled using lighweight steel members that are combined like a mesh with singularities (lamina) to take up large scale structural loads and continue them through the Primary and Secondary structures. The “envelope” is a series of EFTE pillows that deflate and inflate according to the solar and optical conditions. The external Primary Structure is also “glazed” with EFTE membrane on a large scale to provide interstitial space and program. Finally, the logic of development and growth is to initiate a condition in which the structure is never complete, but always evolving and changing. That is, “pods” can be continuously added and transformed according to programmatic need. The building is kind of like a lattice on which to grow a vine from which to grow grapes. That’s a kind of gross analogy, but topologically, it works.
Project 3: PERFORMA PAVILION
Location: MANHATTAN
Date: 2011
Client: PERFORMA
Digital tools: COMPUTATIONAL FLUID DYNAMICS
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
PETER MACAPIA
Description:
The Performa Pavilion the result of a study of using vacant lots in the urban environment for environmental and tectonic exploration of urban porosity and topology. The basic interest is to develop projects that operate in terms of the following principle: the geometry and topology of matter/energy relations.Computational Fluid dynamics was a way to develop minimal surfaces or surfaces with great tension that could vary in their spatial and organizational qualities – that is, it would provide a condition of constant transformation. The framing system was developed using a stochastic geometry for the super frame, and a more subtle topologically sensitive geometry for the secondary one that could be moved and transformed according to the needs of the installation and transformation of tensile fabric. At the same time, the interest in a lightweight above ground structure that implicitly relies on a kind of already situated infrastructure was an important projection regarding cities of high density, public space, and sustainability. Projects like this are not mean to follow the traditional notion of a building as a solid permanent mass – it is rather nomadic.
LUCIO SANTOS (DIGITAL RESEARCH PRACTICE)
Studio description
Lúcio Santos is an Architect working in New York City. His design focuses on modularity and generative systems as a method of creating complex geometries from standard materials and fabrication methods. His research is process driven and focuses on simplicity while developing clear formal gestures.
Lúcio Santos graduated from the Architectural Association Design Research Lab [DRL] post-graduate program in 2005 receiving a Master of Architecture and Urbanism, and the New Jersey School of Architecture [NJIT] in 2003 where he received a Bachelor of Architecture degree.
His work experience spans both the US and Europe where he has worked on projects ranging from high-end residential additions and housing complexes to pedestrian bridges, hotels, football stadiums and cultural pavilions. His interest in design as a process of formal experimentation has developed a varied body of work which is constantly evolving.
Lúcio Santos has worked for Zaha Hadid Architects on the Zaragoza Bridge Pavilion for the 2008 World Expo from schematic design to the production of construction drawings. He was in charge of rationalizing the 3d geometry and overall design development of the bridge, where he worked closely with Arup London and Spanish steel fabricators, developing the primary structure and substructure to produce a repetitive system of panelization for the curved façade. Lúcio worked for the office of Farjadi Architects in London & SOM in New York as a Senior Designer where he was the lead designer on several projects in the US and Middle East.
Project 1: XO.S TOWER
Credits: Design/ fabrication /Implementation
LUCIO SANTOS
Lúcio Santos is an Architect working in New York City. His design focuses on modularity and generative systems as a method of creating complex geometries from standard materials and fabrication methods. His research is process driven and focuses on simplicity while developing clear formal gestures.
Lúcio Santos graduated from the Architectural Association Design Research Lab [DRL] post-graduate program in 2005 receiving a Master of Architecture and Urbanism, and the New Jersey School of Architecture [NJIT] in 2003 where he received a Bachelor of Architecture degree.
His work experience spans both the US and Europe where he has worked on projects ranging from high-end residential additions and housing complexes to pedestrian bridges, hotels, football stadiums and cultural pavilions. His interest in design as a process of formal experimentation has developed a varied body of work which is constantly evolving.
Lúcio Santos has worked for Zaha Hadid Architects on the Zaragoza Bridge Pavilion for the 2008 World Expo from schematic design to the production of construction drawings. He was in charge of rationalizing the 3d geometry and overall design development of the bridge, where he worked closely with Arup London and Spanish steel fabricators, developing the primary structure and substructure to produce a repetitive system of panelization for the curved façade. Lúcio worked for the office of Farjadi Architects in London & SOM in New York as a Senior Designer where he was the lead designer on several projects in the US and Middle East.
Project 1: XO.S TOWER
Credits: Design/ fabrication /Implementation
LUCIO SANTOS
XO.S PAVILION
The XO.S PAVILION is a formal exercise emulating biomorphic exoskeletal systems, intended to be used as a temporary place of gathering. It funnels pedestrians from one end to the other, compressing at the center and then widening at both ends dividing space into two zones.
The pavilion is fabricated from stainless steel folded strips, laser-cut from flat sheets and welded together. The exterior is painted with a high-gloss black car paint finish while the interior and inner faces are painted white.
Project 2: FACETED FIBROUS STRUCTURES
Credits:
Design/ fabrication /Implementation
LUCIO SANTOS
Description
FACETED FIBROUS STRUCTURES is a research endeavor focusing on producing complex double-curved structural geometries using standard planar materials assembled together in linear strips. When a material is folded its bending strength is increased parallel to the fold. Using ancient paper folding techniques (origami) as inspiration, the concept of folding flat metal sheets allows one to triangulate geometries and generate long volumetric folded strips that can then be assembled together to create structural ribs. The apertures and depth of the faceted system can be sized according to solar gain requirements as well as structural performance criteria and/or weight reduction necessity. Using standard CAD/CAM technologies, the folded strips can be easily manufactured from planar sheets using CNC, laser, or water-jet cutters.Design of the FACETED FIBROUS STRUCTURES was developed in Rhino using Rhino Scripting. The structure is generated using a base surface onto which 3 layers of points are plotted. The top layer represents the exterior, the middle layer the center, and the bottom layer the interior. Surfaces are then created from the points using an elongated hexagonal pattern.
MARK BEARAK (DIGITAL RESEARCH PRACTICE)
Project 1: COMMUNITY SYNTHESIZER
Location: NEW YORK, NY, USA
Date: SPRING 2006
Client: COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
Digital tools: MEL SCRIPT, MAYA
Credits:
Design/ fabrication/
Implementation
MARK BEARAK
Description:
This project was my first attempt to generate a building solely from an algorithm. The idea being that an algorithm, in this case a variation of cellular automata or the game of life, could create an undulating porous surface that could synthesize programmatic inputs. Over time the system would create order and reason based on a variety of factors that would eventually create scaled responses such as floors and walls. Each of the iterations worked sequentially; this took advantage of the fact that the script was generated using MEL script for Maya, an engine that utilizes a timeline. While each moment of the iteration as fleeting to the casual observer, a second script was cataloging the results and then testing them with the proposed program. Over time,
the cellular automata not only dictated the perforations in the skin, but also influenced the size and location of specific rooms. The final product shown was the direct result of the script, not a single surface was modeled. In the truest state, the digital process leads to the unknown. The result of this script was something all together new, but not necessarily surprising. I found that imputing contextual factors, such as program and site, coupled with the control over the could create something not only controlled but ultimately plausible.
Project 2: TOWER TRAJECTORY
Location: NEW YORK, NY, USA
Date: SPRING 2008
Client: COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
Digital tools: VISUAL BASICS, RHINO
Credits:
Design/ fabrication /
Location: NEW YORK, NY, USA
Date: SPRING 2006
Client: COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
Digital tools: MEL SCRIPT, MAYA
Credits:
Design/ fabrication/
Implementation
MARK BEARAK
Description:
This project was my first attempt to generate a building solely from an algorithm. The idea being that an algorithm, in this case a variation of cellular automata or the game of life, could create an undulating porous surface that could synthesize programmatic inputs. Over time the system would create order and reason based on a variety of factors that would eventually create scaled responses such as floors and walls. Each of the iterations worked sequentially; this took advantage of the fact that the script was generated using MEL script for Maya, an engine that utilizes a timeline. While each moment of the iteration as fleeting to the casual observer, a second script was cataloging the results and then testing them with the proposed program. Over time,
the cellular automata not only dictated the perforations in the skin, but also influenced the size and location of specific rooms. The final product shown was the direct result of the script, not a single surface was modeled. In the truest state, the digital process leads to the unknown. The result of this script was something all together new, but not necessarily surprising. I found that imputing contextual factors, such as program and site, coupled with the control over the could create something not only controlled but ultimately plausible.
Project 2: TOWER TRAJECTORY
Location: NEW YORK, NY, USA
Date: SPRING 2008
Client: COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
Digital tools: VISUAL BASICS, RHINO
Credits:
Design/ fabrication /
Implementation
MARK BEARAK
Description:
The tower exercise is a literal example of distance based trajectories coupled with programmatic inputs. In this scenario 6 groups of 30 trajectories are taken over a fictitious undulating cylindrical surface. Each time one of the 6 groups would intersect with an adjacent group, both would switch trajectories.
This would also create the opportunity to build programmatic pockets within the 30 trajectories of each group. Thus an entire city could be built in the sky based on a few mathematical principals. The various versions of the tower were generated by allowing the script to randomly choose the starting point and the initial trajectory of each of the groups. While this created an amazing array of results it also pointed out the contradiction of using something purely random in architecture. Over time more and more of the resulting towers had to be thrown out due to programmatic impossibilities. Eventually the window of randomness had to evolve into something far more controlled and ordered. This was achieved by creating a secondary script that was testing the outcomes of a purely random initial state. The tower was generated using Visual Basics for Rhino which had the ability to handle thousands of compound curves. Using that power, the script was able to generate thousands of different tower options based on those curves. It would be impossible to sort and categorize each of these towers through traditional manners so I started evaluating the overall set by their level of fitness. A second script was written that would color code each bundle of curves based on certain levels of fitness such as how many potential pods were generated or the feasibility of the structure. Over time the script would whittle down the numerous towers to one ideal tower that was considered most fit based on the tangible inputs.
MARK BEARAK
Description:The tower exercise is a literal example of distance based trajectories coupled with programmatic inputs. In this scenario 6 groups of 30 trajectories are taken over a fictitious undulating cylindrical surface. Each time one of the 6 groups would intersect with an adjacent group, both would switch trajectories.
This would also create the opportunity to build programmatic pockets within the 30 trajectories of each group. Thus an entire city could be built in the sky based on a few mathematical principals. The various versions of the tower were generated by allowing the script to randomly choose the starting point and the initial trajectory of each of the groups. While this created an amazing array of results it also pointed out the contradiction of using something purely random in architecture. Over time more and more of the resulting towers had to be thrown out due to programmatic impossibilities. Eventually the window of randomness had to evolve into something far more controlled and ordered. This was achieved by creating a secondary script that was testing the outcomes of a purely random initial state. The tower was generated using Visual Basics for Rhino which had the ability to handle thousands of compound curves. Using that power, the script was able to generate thousands of different tower options based on those curves. It would be impossible to sort and categorize each of these towers through traditional manners so I started evaluating the overall set by their level of fitness. A second script was written that would color code each bundle of curves based on certain levels of fitness such as how many potential pods were generated or the feasibility of the structure. Over time the script would whittle down the numerous towers to one ideal tower that was considered most fit based on the tangible inputs.
CATERINA TIAZZOLDI / NUOVA ORDENTRA – (DESIGN PRACTICE)
Studio description
Caterina Tiazzoldi’s agenda develops design tools to face creatively the complexity of today’s cities. Work and research are characterized by a strong interaction between an advanced digital research in architecture, developed in the academic and scientific field at the Politecnico di Torino and Columbia University, with ten years’ experience in the product and architectural design.
Nominated at the Cooper Hewitt National Design Award, Caterina Tiazzoldi/ Nuova Ordentra work engages the concept of repeatability, adaptability, recognition and variation where she developed a deep understanding of needs of contemporary spatial modules conceived to respond to different contextual conditions and requirement.
The firm has been invited to participate to several international events such as Torino World Design Capital, the Young Design Talent selection by Giulio Cappellini for the Temporary Museum for New Design, Advanced Architecture Biennal Settimo Tokio, Experimenta Design, Compotec.
Caterina Tiazzoldi – Nuova Ordentra work has been internationally presented in conferences and symposiums (Institut of Architectura Avancada de Cataluña, Nuova Accademia di Belle Arti, Columbia University, has been published in the magazines (Domus, Interni, Metropolis,Elle Décor), books (Shops 2009) and scientific publications (Nominated Best Paper by the ARCC Journal).
Caterina Tiazzoldi’s agenda develops design tools to face creatively the complexity of today’s cities. Work and research are characterized by a strong interaction between an advanced digital research in architecture, developed in the academic and scientific field at the Politecnico di Torino and Columbia University, with ten years’ experience in the product and architectural design.
Nominated at the Cooper Hewitt National Design Award, Caterina Tiazzoldi/ Nuova Ordentra work engages the concept of repeatability, adaptability, recognition and variation where she developed a deep understanding of needs of contemporary spatial modules conceived to respond to different contextual conditions and requirement.
The firm has been invited to participate to several international events such as Torino World Design Capital, the Young Design Talent selection by Giulio Cappellini for the Temporary Museum for New Design, Advanced Architecture Biennal Settimo Tokio, Experimenta Design, Compotec.
Caterina Tiazzoldi – Nuova Ordentra work has been internationally presented in conferences and symposiums (Institut of Architectura Avancada de Cataluña, Nuova Accademia di Belle Arti, Columbia University, has been published in the magazines (Domus, Interni, Metropolis,Elle Décor), books (Shops 2009) and scientific publications (Nominated Best Paper by the ARCC Journal).
Project 1: IOS SPA
Location: TORINO
Date: 2009
Client: IOS SPA
Digital tools:
GRASSHOPPER APPLICATION CONTROLLONG THE EXTRUSION OF DIFFERENT ELEMENTS. PARAMETRIC SYSTEM BASED ON A IF / THEN LOGIC CONTOLLING THE ACTIVATION OF FUNCTIONAL SPACE 9CHAIR, DESK, MAIL BOX)XTREMITIES.
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
CATERINA TIAZZOLDI / NUOVA ORDENTRA
TEAM: LORENZA CROCE, MAURO FASSINO
Project 2 : PARAMETRIC STALACTITES
Date: 2008
Digital tools:
GRASSHOPPER APPLICATION: PARAMETRIC STALACTITE MODEL HAS BEEN DEVELOPED WITH A SOFTWARE APPLICATION PERMITTING TO CONNECT THE LENGTH AND THE DENSITY OF \ THE EXTRUSION WITH THE DISTANCE BETWEEN OF STALACTITES EXTREMITIES.
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
CATERINA TIAZZOLDI / NUOVA ORDENTRA
TEAM: LORENZA CROCE
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
CATERINA TIAZZOLDI / NUOVA ORDENTRA
TEAM: LORENZA CROCE
Parametric Stalactites is a design proposal for a luxury Italian shoe brand. It has been conceived as an adaptable layout for a shoe store.
The Parametric Stalactites design derives from a unique parametric digital model that can achieve different configurations. All the surfaces are conceived as an assembly of 45x45 cm ‘smart parametric tiles’ responding to the different spatial requirements of the various store locations. Each tile can be more or less extruded according to the size of the store and the quantity of shoes on display.
Parametric Stalactites engages the concept of repeatability, adaptability, recognition and variation where she developed a deep understanding of needs of contemporary commercial modules and their requirements to respond to different contextual conditions.
Project 3 Name: PARAMETRIC BOOKSHELVES
Date: 2006-2009
Client: MULTIPLE
Digital tools:
MAYA MEL SCRIPT BASED ON A IF/THEN RULE SYSTEM CONNECTING COLOR SATURATION AND DEPTH WITH CUSTOMERS DIMENTIONAL REQUIREMENT
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
CATERINA TIAZZOLDI/NUOVA ORDENTRA
TEAM: LORENZA CROCE, DORA KELLER
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
CATERINA TIAZZOLDI/NUOVA ORDENTRA
TEAM: LORENZA CROCE, DORA KELLER
Description
PARAMETRIC BOOKSHELVES - Adaptation to clients requirements Parametric Bookshelves is an adaptable piece of furniture. A unique digital model produces infinite configurations on the bases of the differents customers requirements.
When introduced as input in the parametric digital model, differenciation becomes a design input.
The system creates endless new configuration by changing tickness color saturation and depth when costumers introduce the size they require.Parametric bookshelves receive the different input and react in accord to determined diversities- It becomes and infinite exensible grid respond to the different conditions to clients diversity.
SUPERMANOEUVRE DAVE PIGRAM + IAIN [MAX] MAXWELL (DIGITAL RESEARCH PRACTICE)
Studio description
supermanoeuvre is an architectural practice dedicated to advancing the application and theory of computational design. The practice was co-founded in 2006 by Dave Pigram and Iain Maxwell and operates out of New York and London. The practice has exhibited in UK, USA, China, Italy and Australia and have lectured on their work at the AA, Columbia University, London’s Royal College of Art, The Pratt Institute, Aalborg University, University of Technology Sydney and the University of Canberra.
Statement on Digital Primitive
supermanoeuvre sees computation as an means of opportunistically collaborating with the heterogeneity and flux of social, cultural and ecological substrates. Seeking to move beyond the diagram as the dominant mode of architectural understanding, supermanoeuvre employs both genetic and phenotypical strategies of formation in which multiple intelligences and behaviors compete for the gift of instantiation. The resulting complex and adaptive morphologies achieve their definition performatively as the emergent outcome of highly specific architectural concerns embedded within generating rulesets.
Project 1: TRABECULAE
Location: NEW YORK
Date: 2008
Client: SELF INITIATED RESEARCH
Digital tools: CUSTOM ALGORITHMS, RHINOCEROS, ISOSURF, 3DSMAX, VRAY
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
DAVE PIGRAM, IAIN MAXWELL
WITH BRAD ROTHEMBERG & EZIO BLASETTI
supermanoeuvre is an architectural practice dedicated to advancing the application and theory of computational design. The practice was co-founded in 2006 by Dave Pigram and Iain Maxwell and operates out of New York and London. The practice has exhibited in UK, USA, China, Italy and Australia and have lectured on their work at the AA, Columbia University, London’s Royal College of Art, The Pratt Institute, Aalborg University, University of Technology Sydney and the University of Canberra.
Statement on Digital Primitive
supermanoeuvre sees computation as an means of opportunistically collaborating with the heterogeneity and flux of social, cultural and ecological substrates. Seeking to move beyond the diagram as the dominant mode of architectural understanding, supermanoeuvre employs both genetic and phenotypical strategies of formation in which multiple intelligences and behaviors compete for the gift of instantiation. The resulting complex and adaptive morphologies achieve their definition performatively as the emergent outcome of highly specific architectural concerns embedded within generating rulesets.
Project 1: TRABECULAE
Location: NEW YORK
Date: 2008
Client: SELF INITIATED RESEARCH
Digital tools: CUSTOM ALGORITHMS, RHINOCEROS, ISOSURF, 3DSMAX, VRAY
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
DAVE PIGRAM, IAIN MAXWELL
WITH BRAD ROTHEMBERG & EZIO BLASETTI
Description
Trabeculae is the result of re-imagining the central atrium office tower. Replacing the traditional operation of repetitive extrusion, a heliotropic branching system actively seeks out those areas within the zoning envelope with greatest access to daylight.
Forking and swelling in response to varying light conditions the atrium is thus conceived as a site specific network that traverses intelligently and freely from one facade to another. The atrium becomes the defining element of differentiation within otherwise normative floor plates while maintaining efficient floor space ratios. Within the atrium a second order proliferation of the same system at a finer scale develops a structural meshwork - the trabeculae. The swellings and coagulations of this topologically free structural network-within-a-network accommodate meeting & function rooms, bridges and communication stairs as well as supporting the atriums glazing. An instantiation of the proto-synthesis algorithm this project embraces the specific heterogeneity of a given scenario and points towards the possibility of architectural speciation.
Project 2: DYGOCITIES I & II
Location: NEW YORK
Date: 2009
Client: THE BRIDGE GALLERY, NEW YORK
Digital tools: CUSTOM ALGORITHMS, RHINOCEROS, 3DSMAX, VRAY
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
DAVE PIGRAM, WES MCGEE, IAIN MAXWELL,
PAULIS AUSTRINS
Description
The bronze portion is created with a custom written genetypical formation algorithm. Both sculptures have the same underlying DNA with different epigenetic results. In this was the two pieces are non-identical twins. The forms are then 3D printed in Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene (ABS) before undergoing a process just like lost wax casting which destroys the positive mold and makes the pieces one of a kind. The bases are CNC (Computer Numericaly Controlled) milled laminated timber/wood.
Project 3: SELFRIDGES STOREFRONT
Location: LONDON, UK
Date: 2008
Client: NOUS GALLERY, LONDON
Digital tools: CUSTOM ALGORITHMS, RHINOCEROS, VRAY
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
DAVE PIGRAM, EZIO BLASETTI,
PERRY HALL, IAIN MAXWELL
Description
A collaboration between supermanoeuvre, Ezio Blasetti and artist Perry Hall, this project combines an alchemical engagement with matter’s self organizing properties with various digitally augmented feedback mechanisms. These mechanisms engage the subject as viewer in a complex inter- and extra-personal collaborative network wherein the crowd, sound waves and liquid matter are entwined through algorithm. The literally infinite and entirely aperiodic waveforms proliferate continuously with lasers used as a reflection based projector. Internal rulesets employed as stimulii when no people are within the sensor zones allow the creation of an infinite feedback loop. This project was commissioned by the Nous Gallery of London and is part of a series of curated installations planned for highly public storefronts in London. Other participants in the series are Phillip Beesley, Kokkugia, Xefirotarch [Hernan Diaz Alonzo], theverymany and SJET.
THEVERYMANY – MARC FORNES (DIGITAL RESEARCH PRACTICE)
Studio description
" the very many " - is a simple assembly of three words: "definite article" (ie Explicit) + "adjective-modifier" (ie Variables) + "plural" (ie Multiplicity). Combined as a motto, it addresses contemporary cultures as complex and intricate systems...
- " theverymany " - identifies a Collective of people as well as a Collection of experiments which engage the field of design via protocols of "precise indetermination".
Project 1: “ECHINOIDS”
Location: BRIDGE GALLERY NEW YORK
Date: 2009
Digital tools:RHINOSCRIPTING / MARC FORNES
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
THEVERYMANY
MARC FORNES, SKYLAR TIBBITS, MAT STAUDT
" the very many " - is a simple assembly of three words: "definite article" (ie Explicit) + "adjective-modifier" (ie Variables) + "plural" (ie Multiplicity). Combined as a motto, it addresses contemporary cultures as complex and intricate systems...
- " theverymany " - identifies a Collective of people as well as a Collection of experiments which engage the field of design via protocols of "precise indetermination".
Project 1: “ECHINOIDS”
Location: BRIDGE GALLERY NEW YORK
Date: 2009
Digital tools:RHINOSCRIPTING / MARC FORNES
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
THEVERYMANY
MARC FORNES, SKYLAR TIBBITS, MAT STAUDT
Description
530 modules - Long. 13.5 ft - large 5 ft - height 7.5 ft
25 sheets ( 4*8' ) Walnut veneer ( 800 sq ft )
1600 yards elastic bras strap ( brown / black / navy blue ) - lacing time: 1/2h /
module - 40 modules / day
4500 screws
Brandt Graves, Carrie Mcknelly, Elliot White, Troy Zezula, Biayna Bogosian, Christine Rogiaman, Jared Laucks, Scott C. Savage, Al Attari, Brian Doyle, Claire Davenport, Claudia Corcilius, Courtney Song, Gary Mellon, Heidi Bullinga, Kamyar Rahimi, Majda Muhic, Marcelo Ertorteguy, Matthew DeLuca, Melissa Funkey, Otilia Pupezeanu, Sara Valente, Simon Kristav, Shadi Arani, Veronica Emig, Marilyn Garber @Bridge Gallery
Invitation: Peter Macapia
Fabrication support: - PRATT INSTITUTE - anyline (laser cutting) (http://www.anylineny.com/)
Support: - McNeel (US & Europe) - TDM Solutions (RhinoNest)
Project 2: "APERIODIC SYMMETRIES"
Location: CALGARY / CANADA
Date: JANUARY 9TH 2009 INSTALLATION PERMANENT
Digital tools: RHINOSCRIPTING / MARC FORNES
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
THEVERYMANY / MARC FORNES WITH SKYLAR TIBBITS
Description
Production: 1640 parts, 757 unique stars connections + 883 panels (11 unique types) 5 days CNC cutting, 8 people, 72hours assembly time, 30 sheets 4*8’ of ½” thick Polyethylene
Sponsors: Sturgess Architecture, Zeidler Partnership Architects, RJC Consulting Engineers
Supported by: Faculty of Environmental Design University of Calgary Canada Faculty support: Jason S. Johnson, Josh Taron Shop support: Craig Le Blanc Students support: Frazer Van Roeckel, Dolores Bender-Graves, Matt Knapic, Bradena Abrams Reid, Carmen Hull, Peter MacRea, Adam Onulov, Tiffany Whitnack
Gallery assistants:
Jordan Allen, Ryan Palibroda
Project 3: “APERIODIC VERTEBRAE V2.0”
Location: FRANKFURT / GERMANY NODE08
Date: APRIL 5-12TH 2008
Digital tools: RHINOSCRIPTING / MARC FORNES
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
THEVERYMANY /
MARC FORNES WITH SKYLARTIBBITS, JARED LAUCKS
Description:
Material:
Polyethylene panels (3/16” thick) + Acrylic connections (3/16”) + Zip Tie fastener
Assembly:
24 hours + 2 people + 2 laptops to (re-)assemble 360 panels & 320 nodes
Sponsors:
- Quadrant EPP USA, Inc. (www.quadrantepp.com) > material
- Continental Signs (www.continentalsigns.net) > CNC cutting
- Dick Dunlop > laser cutting
Material:
Polyethylene panels (3/16” thick) + Acrylic connections (3/16”) + Zip Tie fastener
Assembly:
24 hours + 2 people + 2 laptops to (re-)assemble 360 panels & 320 nodes
Sponsors:
- Quadrant EPP USA, Inc. (www.quadrantepp.com) > material
- Continental Signs (www.continentalsigns.net) > CNC cutting
- Dick Dunlop > laser cutting
TIETZ & BACCON LLC ERIK TIETZ + ANDREW BACCON (DIGITAL FABRICATION)
Studio description
Tietz-Baccon is a full-service Design & Fabrication shop, based in Long Island City, NY. Established by Architects with diverse skills and a passion for detail, we place an emphasis on technology and craft to bring innovative concepts to life. We have the resources and aptitude for projects at all scales, and can provide assistance at every phase of the design process from concept to final production. www.tietz-baccon.com.
Statement on Digital Primitive
While the direct translation of digital models into physical components allows architects and designers to consider novel forms and techniques, expanding design possibilities, it has become even more imperative that the fabrication and assembly process is resolved up-front. Regardless of the complexity, all projects that are built must face the same realities of material, tolerance, assembly, budget, and performance. This has always been the case. We are in the infancy of what will someday be a ubiquitous process, and the vast array of research today promises to yield tomorrows standards. The goal is that trough exploring the limits of these digital tools and technology; we can better understand how to design something to be built, as opposed to relying on technology to figure out how to build something that is designed.
Project 1: DVF MODULAR EXHIBITION BOOTH
Location: NEW YORK
Date: 2009
Client: DIANE VON FURSTENBERG
Digital tools:
RHINOCEROS, PROPRIETARY SCRIPTS, ADDITIONAL TOOLING/POST-PROCESSING SOFTWARE, CNC-ROUTER
Credits:
Design/ fabrication/ implementation
TIETZ-BACCON WITH DIANE VON FURSTENBERG
Description
The modules allow for the rapid assembly of temporary, freestanding exhibition & trade-show spaces. The set of CNC-milled frames connect with integrated locking hardware, accepting interchangeable faces. The example shown here uses 2 different types of embossed faces: one for the DVF logo and one for the DVF “signature print” pattern. The logos and patterns were surface-milled on the CNC-Router.
Project 2: RECEPTION DESK
Location: DURANGO, COLORADO
Date: AUGUST, 2009
Client: FORT LEWIS COLLEGE
Digital tools:
RHINOCEROS, PROPRIETARY SCRIPTS, ADDITIONAL TOOLING/POST-PROCESSING SOFTWARE, CNC-ROUTER
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
TIETZ-BACCON WITH PERRY DEAN ROGERS PARTNERS
Tietz-Baccon is a full-service Design & Fabrication shop, based in Long Island City, NY. Established by Architects with diverse skills and a passion for detail, we place an emphasis on technology and craft to bring innovative concepts to life. We have the resources and aptitude for projects at all scales, and can provide assistance at every phase of the design process from concept to final production. www.tietz-baccon.com.
Statement on Digital Primitive
While the direct translation of digital models into physical components allows architects and designers to consider novel forms and techniques, expanding design possibilities, it has become even more imperative that the fabrication and assembly process is resolved up-front. Regardless of the complexity, all projects that are built must face the same realities of material, tolerance, assembly, budget, and performance. This has always been the case. We are in the infancy of what will someday be a ubiquitous process, and the vast array of research today promises to yield tomorrows standards. The goal is that trough exploring the limits of these digital tools and technology; we can better understand how to design something to be built, as opposed to relying on technology to figure out how to build something that is designed.
Project 1: DVF MODULAR EXHIBITION BOOTH
Location: NEW YORK
Date: 2009
Client: DIANE VON FURSTENBERG
Digital tools:
RHINOCEROS, PROPRIETARY SCRIPTS, ADDITIONAL TOOLING/POST-PROCESSING SOFTWARE, CNC-ROUTER
Credits:
Design/ fabrication/ implementation
TIETZ-BACCON WITH DIANE VON FURSTENBERG
Description
The modules allow for the rapid assembly of temporary, freestanding exhibition & trade-show spaces. The set of CNC-milled frames connect with integrated locking hardware, accepting interchangeable faces. The example shown here uses 2 different types of embossed faces: one for the DVF logo and one for the DVF “signature print” pattern. The logos and patterns were surface-milled on the CNC-Router.
Project 2: RECEPTION DESK
Location: DURANGO, COLORADO
Date: AUGUST, 2009
Client: FORT LEWIS COLLEGE
Digital tools:
RHINOCEROS, PROPRIETARY SCRIPTS, ADDITIONAL TOOLING/POST-PROCESSING SOFTWARE, CNC-ROUTER
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
TIETZ-BACCON WITH PERRY DEAN ROGERS PARTNERS
Description:
Vertically laminated FSC-certified, no-added-urea-formaldehyde MDF components are assembled into modules in the shop. The modules have been designed to rapidly bolt together with hidden hardware on-site to minimize labor. The automation of the component generation from the digital model is absolutely necessary for a project with this number of pieces in an effort to meet budgets and deadlines. Digital tools allow us to generate the form in a way that ensures assembly is possible and can be optimized to minimize material waste, reduce unnecessary weight, and integrate other materials such as countertops.
Project 3: DIFFA TABLE (DESIGN INDUSTRIES FOUNDATION FIGHTING AIDS)
Location: NEW YORK
Date: 2009
Client: SHOP ARCHITECTS/SUPIMA COTTON/ THE NEW YORK TIMES
Digital tools: TOOLING/POST-PROCESSING SOFTWARE, CNC-ROUTER
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
TIETZ-BACCON WITH SHOP ARCHITECTS
Description: Tietz-Baccon provided digital fabrication services for the components of the table/booth designed by SHoP Architects. Structural components were CNCmilled from FR Baltic Birch Plywood, while other components were cut on the CNC-Router from wood-printed Plastic Laminate. The final assembly also integrated upholstery to further add to the effect of the cotton flower theme of the table. While the installation was erected for only one week, it was a successful part of the DIFFA (Design Industries Foundation Fighting AIDS) fundraiser banquet.
Z-A STUDIO/ GUY ZUCKER – (DESIGN PRACTICE)
Studio description
Z-A is dedicated to exposing the unexpected in the mundane.
Z-A explores extreme material implications of the most ordinary constraints. Structural efficiency, budget limitations or camouflaged identity generate the selection of adequate material or material quality in response.
Z-A uses these “found” materials in conjunction with one mode of operation to create a specific material organization.
From Z to A; choosing the material at the beginning reverses the typical design process where materials are applied onto a concept. This approach enables the flexible evolution of the design where instead of having a fixed idea, the design is, in effect, the reaction of the material organization to added layers of information.
Z-A believes that a sustainable project is first and foremost a project that can live longer. A flexible, design approach equips the project with the ability to adapt and respond to changing needs, uses and identities over time.
Statement on Digital Primitive
Digital: Z-A is based on digital thinking, where the digital is ingrained in every aspect of the work; from aesthetic sensibility to structural morphology.
Primitive: Z-A starts with the mundane and the ordinary in an attempt to generate a result that
while complex in information is primitive in its effect.
Digital: Z-A employs digital thinking to generate an array of digital organization in response to different conditions: fields, intensities, loops, bands etc.
Primitive: Z-A wants its projects to have the impact of the Grand Canyon.
Digital: Z-A uses repetition as the connecting thread between the different organization schemes.
Primitive: Z-A uses repetition, which is basically the same object over and over and over…
Digital: Z-A uses repetitive systems, which have an inherent efficiency in their production of similar elements while capable of absorbing mutations and deviations.
Primitive: Z-A uses repetition of the same visual effect a number of times in the same composition to produce the dominance of one visual idea in a planned pattern, or a rhythmic movement.
Digital: Z-A sketches in 3D software
Primitive: Z-A is constantly searching for “new” old materials to experiment with
Digital: Z-A generates custom patterns, custom colors and custom forms.
Primitive: Z-A produces custom patterns, custom colors and custom forms with primitive materials.
The transformation of a basic, pedestrian material is heightened by the sophisticated design
process.
Digital: Z-A believes that digital tools, by putting more control in the hands of the designer, might help reverse the eroded roll of the architect.
Primitive: Z-A believes that primitive materials can help shift the focus to the roll of the architect as the one who commands these materials and is responsible for their transformation into sophisticated spaces.
Primitive: Primitive is a subjective label used to imply that one thing is less “sophisticated” or less “advanced” than some other things. (Wikipedia)
Digital: The word digital is most commonly used in the context of a logical 0(pulse present and/or high) or a logical 1 (pulse absent and/or low). (Wikipedia)
>> Digital=Primitive? :-)
Project 1: A BUILDING FOR BOOKS
Location: PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC
Date: SEPTEMBER 2006
Client: CITY OF PRAGUE
Digital tools: RHINO + SCRIPTING
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
Z-A STUDIO and STUDIO ST
GUY ZUCKER, ESTHER SPERBER
Z-A is dedicated to exposing the unexpected in the mundane.
Z-A explores extreme material implications of the most ordinary constraints. Structural efficiency, budget limitations or camouflaged identity generate the selection of adequate material or material quality in response.
Z-A uses these “found” materials in conjunction with one mode of operation to create a specific material organization.
From Z to A; choosing the material at the beginning reverses the typical design process where materials are applied onto a concept. This approach enables the flexible evolution of the design where instead of having a fixed idea, the design is, in effect, the reaction of the material organization to added layers of information.
Z-A believes that a sustainable project is first and foremost a project that can live longer. A flexible, design approach equips the project with the ability to adapt and respond to changing needs, uses and identities over time.
Statement on Digital Primitive
Digital: Z-A is based on digital thinking, where the digital is ingrained in every aspect of the work; from aesthetic sensibility to structural morphology.
Primitive: Z-A starts with the mundane and the ordinary in an attempt to generate a result that
while complex in information is primitive in its effect.
Digital: Z-A employs digital thinking to generate an array of digital organization in response to different conditions: fields, intensities, loops, bands etc.
Primitive: Z-A wants its projects to have the impact of the Grand Canyon.
Digital: Z-A uses repetition as the connecting thread between the different organization schemes.
Primitive: Z-A uses repetition, which is basically the same object over and over and over…
Digital: Z-A uses repetitive systems, which have an inherent efficiency in their production of similar elements while capable of absorbing mutations and deviations.
Primitive: Z-A uses repetition of the same visual effect a number of times in the same composition to produce the dominance of one visual idea in a planned pattern, or a rhythmic movement.
Digital: Z-A sketches in 3D software
Primitive: Z-A is constantly searching for “new” old materials to experiment with
Digital: Z-A generates custom patterns, custom colors and custom forms.
Primitive: Z-A produces custom patterns, custom colors and custom forms with primitive materials.
The transformation of a basic, pedestrian material is heightened by the sophisticated design
process.
Digital: Z-A believes that digital tools, by putting more control in the hands of the designer, might help reverse the eroded roll of the architect.
Primitive: Z-A believes that primitive materials can help shift the focus to the roll of the architect as the one who commands these materials and is responsible for their transformation into sophisticated spaces.
Primitive: Primitive is a subjective label used to imply that one thing is less “sophisticated” or less “advanced” than some other things. (Wikipedia)
Digital: The word digital is most commonly used in the context of a logical 0(pulse present and/or high) or a logical 1 (pulse absent and/or low). (Wikipedia)
>> Digital=Primitive? :-)
Project 1: A BUILDING FOR BOOKS
Location: PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC
Date: SEPTEMBER 2006
Client: CITY OF PRAGUE
Digital tools: RHINO + SCRIPTING
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
Z-A STUDIO and STUDIO ST
GUY ZUCKER, ESTHER SPERBER
Description
Reexamining the evolution of the Library typology stood at the basis of the design process. The accelerated growth of information merged with the iconic role of the central library, generated the design scheme. In this scheme the mass of books regains its spatial presence through the recon¬figuring of its organization and by em¬bedding constant growth and mutation capabilities into the design.
Turning the book mass into building structure was the main vehicle for obtaining the strong physical presence of the books. This operation generated three different structural types in re¬sponse to the three occupants of the library; books, public and staff.
Using the bookshelf spacing as the module, the structure is based on a dense grid of columns; 1m x 2.25m apart, which supports both the book¬shelves and the building as a whole.
Project 2 : OFF THE WALL
Location: NEW YORK CITY
Date: MARCH, 2008
Client: THE JEWISH MUSEUM
Digital tools: RHINO + LASER CUTTER
Credits:
Design/ fabrication / Implementation
Z-A STUDIO and STUDIO ST
GUY ZUCKER, ESTHER SPERBER
Description
Similar to the way the art reinterprets the content of the museum, its art collection, the design reinterprets the context of the museum, its art handling and shipping. The cardboard from the back rooms of the museum is brought to the front of the house and into the space of the gallery, giving new meaning to the internal mechanisms of the museum. Exhibition design is possibly one of the more extreme cases of short lived architecture. As such it provides an opportunity for integrating the life expectancy of the project as a driving force for the design. The before and afterlife of the project become crucial participants in the design process where the use of ephemeral materials (the cardboard) merely shift the matrix of the routine operations of the museum.
Project 3: CARDBOARD FIGURES
Location: CHICAGO, ILLINOIS
Date: NOVEMBER 2008
Client: AIDA
Digital tools: RHINO + LASER CUTTER
Credits:Design/ fabrication / Implementation
Z-A STUDIO / GUY ZUCKER
GUY ZUCKER, ADAM HOSTETLER
Description
Cardboard - without substance; “cardboard caricatures of historical figures”.
We looked at stalagmites, and the way retain their simple beauty at the individual level, while at the same time they create an intricate field condition at the scale of the cave. As such, we reated a single language of paper tubes throughout the space. The repetition of vertical tubes at different heights transformed the typical pedestal into an over grown display topography. The design and locations of the different height tubes was generated parametrically, which enabled the precise tweaking and fast updating of the design to fit the artists’ ever-changing.
Friday, September 18, 2009
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
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