Concrete Canvas and Concrete Canvas Shelters
"Concrete Canvas Ltd. manufacture a ground breaking material technology called Concrete Canvas that allows concrete to be used in a completely new way. Concrete Canvas was originally developed for the award winning Concrete Canvas Shelters, a building in a bag that requires only water and air for construction."
(Concrete Canvas Ltd.)
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Modular architecture central to Christchurch's urban regeneration
"Martin Trusttum, from CPIT's Faculty of Creative Industries, likens his ArtBox project to a game of Tetris. 'It's just like Tetris but in slow motion. They are cubes and eventually they will come together to form a precinct.'
ArtBox will be located on the corner of Madras and St Asaph streets on the old Southlander Tavern-Jetset Lounge site opposite Anton Parsons' sculpture Passing Time.
It is a rare collection of mobile and flexible modules designed by Sydenham-based F3 and will offer about 18 spaces suitable for galleries and studios. It offers a practical, timely solution to the many low-cost premises used as galleries and studios destroyed by the February 2011 earthquake. "
(Vicki Anderson, 07 September 2012, Stuff.co.nz)
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Muzeul Civilizatiei Populare Traditionale ASTRA (Romania)
"Loc ideal pentru păstrarea spiritului românesc autentic, Muzeul în aer liber din Dumbrava Sibiului este aşezat într-un adevărat paradis, în rezervaţia naturală "Dumbrava Sibiului". Dispunând de un lac şi de peste zece kilometri de alei, muzeul prilejuieşte plimbări de tot felul, de la clasicul mers pe jos, până la un scurt tur cu trăsura, cu sania sau cu barca. ...
Povestea Muzeului ASTRA începe în urmă cu mai bine de un secol, odată cu primele manifestări ale unui vis al românilor din Transilvania de a organiza la Sibiu, sub egida Asociaţiunii pentru Literatura Română şi Cultura Poporului Român, o colecţie etnografică. Aceasta avea rolul de a pune în valoare cele mai reprezentative mărturii despre specificul românesc, despre ceea ce ne diferenţia în comparaţie cu alte popoare, lucruri şi fenomene care puteau explica tuturor cine suntem. „Productele” măiestriei românilor trebuia să reprezinte dovada creativităţii tehnice şi ale hărniciei acestui neam. Prima expoziţie a Muzeului Asociaţiunii, instituţie de la care provine numele ASTRA, a avut loc în 1905."
(Complexul Naţional Muzeal ASTRA)
[This stunning open-air folk museum is located in a nature reserve on the outskirts of Sibiu in România.]
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Transitional Cardboard Cathedral for Christchurch
"2011年2月22日に発生したM6.3のカンタベリー地震は、街のシンボル的存在であったクライストチャーチ大聖堂にも深刻な被害をもたらした。これを受け、新たな仮設のカテドラルを設計することとなった。
現地で調達可能な紙管とコンテナーを用いて三角形の断面を形成する。オリジナルの大聖堂の平面と立面のジオメトリーを受け継ぎ、同じ長さの紙管の角度を徐々に変化させている。700人収容可能で、教会としての機能の他に、多くのイベントやコンサートとしての使用も視野に入れている。
2011年7月31日に、同地にてプレス発表が行われた。2013年2月頃の完成を目指している。
The February 2011 Christchurch earthquake (magnitude 6.3) inflicted crippling damage on the Christchurch Cathedral which was the symbol of city. In response to this situation, we were asked to design new temporary cathedral.
Paper tubes of the equal length and 20 ft containers form triangular shape. Since geometry is decided by plan and elevations of the original cathedral, there is a gradual change in each angle of paper tubes. This cathedral, which has a capacity of 700 people, can be used as an event space and a concert space.
There was a media conference in Christchurch on 31st of July, 2011. We aim to open cardboard cathedral in February, 2013."
(Shigeru Ban Architects)
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Achim Menges: Architecture and Product Design Research
"Architecture as a material practice is predominately based on an approach to design that is characterised by prioritising the elaboration of form over its subsequent materialisation. Since the Renaissance the increasing division between processes of design and making has led to the age-long development and increasing dependence on representational tools intended for explicit, scalar geometric descriptions that at the same time serve as instructions for the translation from drawing to building. Inevitably, and with few exceptions, even in today's digital practice architects embrace design methods that epitomize the hierarchical separation of form definition and materialisation.
The research of the Institute for Computational Design explores an alternative, morphogenetic approach to design that unfolds morphological complexity and performative capacity from material constituents without differentiating between formation and materialisation processes. This requires an understanding of form, material, structure and environment not as separate aspects, but rather as complex interrelations that are embedded in and explored through integral computational processes.
The notion of material system constitutes one central aspect of this research. Material system does not only refer to the material constituents of a building alone, but rather describes, in a system-theoretical sense, the complex reciprocity between materiality, form, structure and space, the related processes of production and assembly, and the multitude of performative effects that emanate from the interaction with environmental influences and forces. This conceptualization of material systems enables the utilization of computational design processes. The ability of computation to simultaneously do both, stochastically derive and systemically process complex datasets within a defined or evolving constraint space, can be utilized to explore a material system's performative capacity within its materially determined limits. Furthermore, continuously informing the form generation with different modes of computational analysis enables a direct link between the ontogeny, the history of structural changes of an individual, and its interaction with external forces and energy respectively, that is its ecological embedding. This enables to conceive of material systems as the synergetic outcome of calibrating and balancing multiple influencing variables and divergent design criteria, which always already include the interaction with the system-external environment. The resultant environmental modulations can now be understood as highly specific patterns in direct relation to the material interventions from which they originate.
The design of space, structure and climate can be synthesized in one integral design process."
(Achim Menges, Achimmenges.net)
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
