9 posts tagged “advanced manufacturing”
In computational design techniques we can perceive the presence of one
What we perceive, or understand as a surface grammar, can be described as the means to generate all the valid strings of a specific surface language; it can also be used as the basis for a recognizer that determines for any given string whether it is grammatical (i.e. belongs to the language). To describe such recognizers, formal language theory uses separate formalisms, known as automata.
In this sense we are using geometry as the basic grammar of the surface explorations. To rigorously investigate this condition the course relies on a contained set of geometrical rules, or strings of information. This container is formed by specific tessellations. Two conditions form the rules of the surface grammar:
Tessellation & Delamination. These two conditions alone can create a thriving array of variation.
It´s about time to mention that the show Housing in Vienna is on show right now in the Ringturm in Vienna. The show was designed by SPAN last year and was first on show in Venice. The second stint of the exhibition was in the Polytecnico Milan, and I´m pretty sure it will be close to your home someday this year, as the tour continues. The design of this show was an important step for us as we could continue our explorations in surface tessellation systems and spatial continuity. Another important aspect for us was to gain further experience in the fabrication processes of complex curved geometries. This explorations are fully integrated in the design of the show.
Here is the link to an Interview I gave for Serial Consign. The conversation with Greg J. Smith was really great and I hope you also enjoy the discussion we had on issues such as Geometry, the Brancusi Museum, digital fabrication, advanced design in architecture and modes of practice:
Dear friends, we cordially invite you to join in into the opening venue of the exhibition housing in Vienna. Curated by Wolfgang Förster, Gabriele Kaiser, Dietmar Steiner and Alexandra the show was commissioned by the Az W (the Architecture center Vienna) and designed by SPAN, Matias del Campo and Sandra Manninger. The show encompasses the famous era of the red Vienna in the 20ies, the craddle of the high qualitz subsidized living in Vienna, ultimatelz focising on the projects of the last decade. The exhibition system consists of 32 Pods that can be arranged in various ways in order to enhance the flexibility of this travelling exhibition.
Some words for the opening by: Dr. Michael Ludwig & Prof. Liliana Padovani.
Opening Venue: Friday, 12.9.2008, 2.30 pm
Hours: Mo – Fr 9.00 am – 07.00 pm
Finissage: Friday, 03.10.2008, 07.00 pm
Facoltà di Pianificazione del territorio and Dipartimento di Pianificazione (Fakultät für Raumplanung und Abteilung für Planung)
Università di Venezia, IUAV
Ca’ Tron
S. Croce 1957
30135 Venice, Italy
Here is a little sneak preview....
If you want to know more about the design concept and the fabrication, click here or here
Based on some of the recent explorations in our practice we designed this semesters task for the Students of the Dessau Institute of Architecture, Bauhaus Dessau: to scrutinize floral entities an their underlying geometric logic to create spatial conditions:
The main aim of this workshop is the exploration of opportunities lying within the field of ornamental colonies. The combination of ornaments and colonies as a main theme of the workshop represents the driving force for a twofold speculation. One layer of this speculation is rooted within biological behavior of colonies. The discipline of Biology refers
to Colonies (from the Latin word colonia) as the agglomeration of several individual organisms of the same species, forming a collective living closely together. The explanation of this behavior is generally related to a mutual benefit for the individual members of the colony, such as stronger defenses or the ability to attack bigger prey.
In terms of architectural argumentation we can consider colonization as an opportunity to occupy niches in the urban ecology such as the roofscapes, underused or difficult sites. Colonies in Biology, such as Barnacle colonies and Mussels colonies serve as study models for possible approaches. These models show the behavior of the population of entities that can be reflected within the design approach, additionally this natural models demonstrate a specific behavior that will become crucial for the results of the workshop: They are not of monocultural nature but are comprised of combinations of species, that finely form a continuous texture.
The Vienna Design Week is on full throttle now with an enormous variety of exhibitions and venues. Within this events I joined a panel discussion in the Musemsquartier to present the work of SPAN in terms of design. The panelists included Dag Holmgren, Elisabeth Menasse-Wiesbauer (Zoom-Kindermuseum), Sybille Straubinger, James Skone and Matias del Campo. The discussion oscillated between pedagogical concepts, ideas on general design approaches and advanced technologies and individualisation of products. Not the newest page on the book, but it seems that there is still a lot to do in terms of informing the public realm in Vienna about possibilities and chances emerging from novel design and fabrication methods, and the entire discussion in terms of the adjanced discoursive body. The new director of the Vienna tourism office, Norbert Kettner, was also present and showed a lot of expertise within this topics, I really enjoyed discussing with him aspects of innovation in form, beauty and esthetics. He pointed out the idea to discuss design in terms of beauty, surface articulation and patterns is deeply rooted within Viennese culture. If I would state an opinion I would say it WAS rooted within this ideas 100 years ago or so, but that mainly Viennese designers have fallen into the same monotone chorus of modern paradigms of design. Maybe it could become again a focus of design by picking up contemporary design methods, advanced fabrication methods and join the discussion on novel issues.
Thank you to Gerin Trautenberger of the Company Microgiants, for inviting me to present some of my projects and discuss within this very interesting group of people.
