Week 9 - Materiality

Architectural design and construction is progressing into using advanced technology due to its improvement of being more accessible from the growth in the economy (Hyde 2012). Due to this accessibility, the experience for the modern day designers and architects have been transformed dramatically as they explore materiality as a way to facilitate the design through its own properties, rather than have the design be facilitated by the materials in order to become a reality in the physical world. As a result, just as Kolarevic states, “the effective digital exchange of information is vital to the realization of the new integrative capacity of architecture” (Kolarevic 2008). Designing and manufacturing have realised a new potential in architecture, reiterating the traditional relationship that also determined the way in which architecture was designed and developed; where the architect previously pre-determined the design prior to acknowledging the material in the process.

It is this combination of the material properties that emerge new design opportunities, which ultimately redefine the relationship between the material and digital technology. Such processes as rapid manufacturing make it “possible to materially realize complex geometric organizational ideas that were previously unattainable” (Kolarevic 2008).

This was only made possible through digital modelling, coding and visual scripting, as designers and architects are able to collaborate with other professions in order to understand material composition and simulation accuracy. Thus an integrative process is required to enable “design innovation as well as driving better outcomes” (Kolarevic 2008). Which in turn repositioned the notion of materials within the process to be as significant as the primary structure of a building as it in fact plays a massive role in the performance of the building.

It is therefore that we must first understand the importance of materials as a significant driver of the early stages in architecture. It’s aesthetic values and psychological notions may be what traditional architecture defined its value, however, it is only through exploring the possibilities emerging from within the material properties can architecture be pushed to its greatest potential.

Menges, A. (2011). Intergral Formation and Materialisation: Computational Form and Material Gesault. Computational design thinking AD reader. A. Menges and S. Ahlquist. Chichester, UK, John Wiley & Sons: 198-210.

Trummer, P. (2011). Associative Design: From Type to Population. Computational design thinking AD reader. A. Menges and S. Ahlquist. Chichester, UK, John Wiley & Sons: 179-197.

Kolarevic, B. and K. R. Klinger (2008). Manufacturing/ Material/ Effects. Manufacturing material effects : rethinking design and making in architecture. B. Kolarevic and K. R. Klinger. New York, Routledge: 5-24.

Bernstein, P. G., A. Inc and Y. University (2008). Thinking versus Making: Remediating Design Practice in the Age of Digital Representation. Manufacturing material effects : rethinking design and making in architecture. B. Kolarevic and K. R. Klinger. New York, Routledge: 61-66.