Courses, News
Introduction to Cognitive Design and Fabrication
“The manifest form—that which appears—is the result of a computational interaction between internal rules and external (morphogenetic) pressures that, themselves, originate in other adjacent forms (ecology). The (pre-concrete) internal rules comprise, in their activity, an embedded form, what is today clearly understood and described by the term algorithm.”
— Who is afraid of formalism?, Sanford Kwinter.
Description
Advances in design computation methods and fabrication techniques provide new possibilities for designers to consider different paradigms for design and making. These paradigms emphasize the relationship between formation and materialization. Form manifestation can be investigated through behavioral, emotional, and cognitive approaches. Cognitive and emotional design approaches center humanity in production processes to address their needs. The implication of human-centered design methods will change the production of goods from mass-production and mass-customization to more personalized manufacturing. This new form of industrial thinking challenges disciplines such as architectural design to profoundly investigate innovative design approaches and fabrication techniques.
The elective course “Introduction to Cognitive Design and Fabrication” introduced students to cognitive design principles, computational design processes, and additive manufacturing techniques. After learning the principles of cognitive design, students developed their own design that applied these principles to the design of “Everyday Things”. This included, for example, items essential to responding to COVID-19, such as face masks, safety glasses, and face shields. In addition, students were introduced to additive manufacturing techniques such as 3D-printing and robotic additive manufacturing to materialize their design.
This course included two workshops. The first, on computational design, discussed integrative computational tools, such as Autodesk Fusion 360, to sketch, design, simulate, and manufacture a design concept. The second workshop focused on robotic 3D-printing and introduced advanced robotic controls to explore experimental robotic fabrication in design.
Selected Project
SMASK: A Smart Mask for Amid/Post-COVID | Developed by: Meng Huang and Xun Liu
Image Credit
L. Aldinger, C. Arias, S. Katz, ICD, University of Stuttgart, 2015/16.
Courses, News
Wood Proto-architecture III: Integrating Design Computation and Materialization
“It is a question of surrendering to the wood, then following where it leads by connecting operations to a materiality, instead of imposing a form upon a matter.”
— Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari
Description
The advanced research studio “Wood Proto-architecture 3.0,” will investigate the generative potential of material systems and fabrication processes in architecture. This studio will explore collaborative design principles for a specific fabrication and construction process, which was studied and developed in the context of the research studios “Wood Proto-architecture 1.0 and 2.0,” through prototyping scaled installations. The aim of this research studio is to develop [Augmented] robotic fabrication to construct experimental timber structures at the school of architecture.
The studio will introduce students to the concept of integrative design computation in architecture. This concept is three-fold: exploring material systems, developing computational design tool, and investigating related fabrication tools. The proposed material system is wood as an anisotropic material with high-performance and adaptation. One challenge of this studio will be the development of a computational framework to integrate material characteristics with related fabrication processes into a design computation method. In addition to exploring material system this research studio will investigate advanced fabrication processes such as robotic fabrication, as a generative driver in design processes. Students will collaborate in fabrication and assembly processes through Mixed reality (MR) technologies, such as Microsoft HoloLens headset to apply their design intention in real-time.
Students will explore a design space, as a parametric space, through a generative design tool to geometrically differentiate and parameterize timber wood structures (such as wood joinery systems). The design explorations are constrained to the fabrication space and material characteristics. The process of form generation in a parametric design space is concurrent with robotic/CNC fabrication of small-scale prototypes. In addition, students will analyze the structural behavior of their prototypes to feed back the simulation results into their design. Prototyping scaled model will help students to understand the process of constructing a one-to-one demonstrator.
Students can work in groups of three. They will be needed to actively take part in design development, fabrication, assembly, and documentation of the project during the fall semester.
This studio includes three workshops: 1) computational design workshop, which will discuss about integrative computational tools, such as Autodesk Fusion 360 to sketch, design, simulate and manufacture a design concept; 2) robotic 3d printing workshop, which will introduce advanced robotic controls to explore the experimental robotic fabrication in design; and 3) Mixed reality workshop, which will introduce the HoloLens Headset to integrate design, fabrication and assembly of final installation through mixed reality technologies.
Selected Project
Robotic Serpentine Wall | Developed by: Leah Kirssin, Bay Penny, Trenton Rhodes
Image Credit
O. Cleary, A. Roletter, E. Fentress, University of Virginia, 2019.
