Simple Systems - Complex Capacities. Integrative Processes of Computational Morphogenesis in Architecture

The complexity of the cultural, social, economical and particularly ecological context in which architecture is practised today necessitates design strategies and tactics that achieve a high level of integration of seemingly opposed demands and criteria within the material and construction systems w...

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Main Author: Achim Menges
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Firenze University Press 2011-11-01
Series:Techne
Subjects:
Online Access:https://oaj.fupress.net/index.php/techne/article/view/4179
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author Achim Menges
author_facet Achim Menges
author_sort Achim Menges
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description The complexity of the cultural, social, economical and particularly ecological context in which architecture is practised today necessitates design strategies and tactics that achieve a high level of integration of seemingly opposed demands and criteria within the material and construction systems we design. One possibility of unfolding novel synergies in such extreme conditions is to utilize the capacity of computers in the design process in an alternative way, one that foregrounds and instrumentalizes the innate capacities of materials, manufacturing and construction processes rather than merely elaborating form in the digital realm. The computational approach that will be presented here questions the nature of current design processes, but it is not a call for the replacement of the architect by computer driven design. Rather, under this approach, architects, instead of creating exuberant shapes subsequently rationalised for constructability and superimposed functions, are able to define specific material and construction systems by the combined logics of formation and materialisation encoded in generative processes of computational morphogenesis.
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spelling doaj.art-a7de6f2743724cee8b3ef8468dd1b5ba2022-12-22T01:59:10ZengFirenze University PressTechne2239-02432011-11-011210.13128/Techne-99289057Simple Systems - Complex Capacities. Integrative Processes of Computational Morphogenesis in ArchitectureAchim MengesThe complexity of the cultural, social, economical and particularly ecological context in which architecture is practised today necessitates design strategies and tactics that achieve a high level of integration of seemingly opposed demands and criteria within the material and construction systems we design. One possibility of unfolding novel synergies in such extreme conditions is to utilize the capacity of computers in the design process in an alternative way, one that foregrounds and instrumentalizes the innate capacities of materials, manufacturing and construction processes rather than merely elaborating form in the digital realm. The computational approach that will be presented here questions the nature of current design processes, but it is not a call for the replacement of the architect by computer driven design. Rather, under this approach, architects, instead of creating exuberant shapes subsequently rationalised for constructability and superimposed functions, are able to define specific material and construction systems by the combined logics of formation and materialisation encoded in generative processes of computational morphogenesis.https://oaj.fupress.net/index.php/techne/article/view/4179Design processComputational approachComputational Morphogenesis
spellingShingle Achim Menges
Simple Systems - Complex Capacities. Integrative Processes of Computational Morphogenesis in Architecture
Techne
Design process
Computational approach
Computational Morphogenesis
title Simple Systems - Complex Capacities. Integrative Processes of Computational Morphogenesis in Architecture
title_full Simple Systems - Complex Capacities. Integrative Processes of Computational Morphogenesis in Architecture
title_fullStr Simple Systems - Complex Capacities. Integrative Processes of Computational Morphogenesis in Architecture
title_full_unstemmed Simple Systems - Complex Capacities. Integrative Processes of Computational Morphogenesis in Architecture
title_short Simple Systems - Complex Capacities. Integrative Processes of Computational Morphogenesis in Architecture
title_sort simple systems complex capacities integrative processes of computational morphogenesis in architecture
topic Design process
Computational approach
Computational Morphogenesis
url https://oaj.fupress.net/index.php/techne/article/view/4179
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