Architecture is born from materials. Between structure, light, movement, and comfort, materials profoundly shape our experiences. But materials also change over time, new ones are created, and a wide range of assemblies and construction techniques are introduced. Increasingly, architects and designers are looking into the possibilities of composite materials made with natural elements.
While research seems intrinsic to the design process, architectural research is a professional path in itself, whose purpose is to highlight scientific evidence and explore alternatives outside of pre-established norms or empirical considerations. Its purpose is to create a framework of knowledge that can inform the design to reach objectively better outcomes. The following discusses the role and state of research in architecture, some prominent areas of inquiry, and the architects or institutions that dedicate their work to these subjects.
In the 12 months since 2018 International Women’s Day, we have seen many female architects come to fore of the design discourse. From Shelley McNamara and Yvonne Farrell’s curation of the 2018 Venice Biennale to Frida Escobedo's celebrated design for the Serpentine Pavilion, the architectural newsfeeds from the past twelve months have played host to many signs of change in a traditionally male-dominated profession.
ArchDaily has also been busy over the past year, publishing stories such as twelve prominent women in architectural photography, seven influential women of the Bauhaus, and the women redefining success in architecture. Beyond news and editorials, the honorary lists and award ceremonies of prominent architectural institutions from around the world have also paid tribute to some of the world’s leading and emerging female architects.
The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) unveiled the seven laureates of the 2019 International Fellowships, a "lifetime honor allows recipients to use the initials Int FRIBA after their name," recognizes the contributions that architects across the world outside of the UK have made in the field of architecture. Previously awarded to architects such as Jeanne Gang and Phillip Cox, the annual Fellowship emphasizes not only the impact of architects' work in their respective homelands but also their global influence.
A juror's committee, consisting of Ben Derbyshire, RIBA President; Lady Patty Hopkins, a 1994 RIBA Gold Medalist; Bob Shiel, a professor at the Bartlett School of Architecture; Wasfi Kani, a 2018 Honorary Fellow; and Pat Woodward RIBA, of Matthew Lloyd Architects, awarded the 2019 Fellows. The fellowships will be presented in London in February 2019.
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The dominating news of the week came courtesy of RIBA and IIT, with the two announcing this year’s laureates of the Stirling Prize and Mies Crown Hall Americas Prize, respectively. Foster + Partners were awarded RIBA’s Stirling Prize for their Bloomberg HQ in London. Said jury member Sir David Adjaye, “Bloomberg is a once-in-a-generation project which has pushed the boundaries of research and innovation in architecture.” The project has been a controversial choice, with some citing the tension between the building’s massive price tag and the current UK housing crisis.
The MIT-based Mediated Matter Group have created Fiberbots, an autonomous digital fabrication platform designed to quickly build architecture during disaster. By utilizing cooperative robotic manufacturing, Fiberbots can create highly sophisticated material structures. The small robots work as a group to wind fiberglass filament and create high-strength tubular structures. MIT researchers envision the bots building in extreme environments and natural disaster zones.
Neri Oxman and MIT have developed programmable water-based biocomposites for digital design and fabrication. Named Aguahoja, the project has exhibited both a pavilion and a series of artifacts constructed from molecular components found in tree branches, insect exoskeletons, and our own bones. It uses natural ecosystems as inspiration for a material production process that produces no waste. “Derived from organic matter, printed by a robot, and shaped by water, this work points toward a future where the grown and the made unite.”
Last month the Norman Foster Foundation, created to promote "interdisciplinary thinking and research to help up-and-coming architects, designers and urbanists to anticipate the future," coincided the opening of its new Madrid-based headquarters with an international conference. Future is Now pulled together a broad collection of professionals—including Sir Jonathan Ive, Marc Newson, Olafur Eliasson, Maya Lin, Alejandro Aravena, and Luis Fernández-Galian—who addressed an audience of 1,800 (including 1,100 students) in the Spanish capital's Royal Theater.
Watch the conference in its entirety, or read a summary, after the break.
In the ancient world, traditional death masks were believed to strengthen and protect the soul of the dead as they progressed to the afterlife. It was this mythical notion of transition from death to new life that inspired Vespers, a collection of death masks from Neri Oxman and her team at MIT’s Mediated Matter Group.
Designer and architect Neri Oxman and the Mediated Matter group have announced their latest design project: the Synthetic Apiary. Aimed at combating the massive bee colony losses that have occurred in recent years, the Synthetic Apiary explores the possibility of constructing controlled, indoor environments that would allow honeybee populations to thrive year-round.
On Friday, September 30, 2016, the US Fish and Wildlife Service added seven species of bees to the Federal Endangered Species list, after a UN-sponsored report released in February found that nearly 40 percent of invertebrate pollinator species (which includes bees and butterflies) are now facing extinction. Bees play a vital role in the reproductive cycle of many plants, including those used for human food production, and according Mediated Matter, losses continuing at these rates could have dire impacts for both human and environmental well-being.
Next Month, architecture will be hitting the mainstream media, as Bjarke Ingels has been selected to grace the cover of the September 2016 edition of WIRED UK. Titled “THINK BIGGER,” the issue will also feature profiles and stories from architects and designers Tom Dixon, Neri Oxman, David Adjaye and Rem Koolhaas. A Condé Nast Publication, the magazine focuses on the effects of science and technology on topics including design, architecture, culture, the economy, politics and philosophy.
Update: In addition to the previous announcement of Neri Oxman and Kevin Spacey as keynote speakers, the AIA has now announced Rem Koolhaas as the headline speaker for day three of this year's convention in Philadelphia. Koolhaas' speech will be titled "Delirious Philadelphia," a playful twist on his seminal book Delirious New York. The following article was originally published on February 11th.
Architect and designer Neri Oxman, head of the Mediated Matter research group at MIT and developer of the “Material Ecology” approach, has given a TED Talk on design as the intersection of technology and biology. Oxman begins her talk by introducing the juxtaposition of left- and right-brain thinking in the design world, noting that her work seeks to marry the two by making design less about assembly of parts, and more about growth. Learn more about Oxman’s distinct work and views by watching the video above.
From interlocking 3D printed bricks to SOM's "All Aboard Florida" train station in West Palm Beach Fast Company has named 13 winners for their 2015 "Innovation By Design Awards." Each winner was selected from over 1,500 projects worldwide for being "big ideas" with "meticulously though out details" and a "clear viewpoint about how we live now—and how it could be better."
This year's winners include...
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Glass can be molded, formed, blown, plated, sintered and now 3D printed. Neri Oxman and her Mediated Matter Group team has just unveiled their new glass printing platform: G3DP: Additive Manufacturing of Optically Transparent Glass. A collaboration with the Glass Lab at MIT, G3DP is the first of its kind and can 3D print optically transparent glass with stunning precision.
"G3DP is an additive manufacturing platform designed to print optically transparent glass," Oxman told ArchDaily. "The tunability enabled by geometrical and optical variation driven by form, transparency and color variation can drive; limit or control light transmission, reflection and refraction, and therefore carries significant implications for all things glass: aerodynamic building facades optimized for solar gain, geometrically customized and variable thickness lighting devices and so on."
Designer and architect Neri Oxman, working with the Mediated Matter group, has unveiled “Mushtari”: a 3D-printed wearable that can convert sunlight into usable products. Joining the “Wanderer” collection, Mushtari was designed as a relationship between the most primitive and most sophisticated life forms. The wearable contains 58 meters of internal fluid channels and functions as a microbial factory, using synthetic biology to convert sunlight into items for the wearer.
Eight practitioners from the US, Canada and Mexico have been selected to receive The Architectural League of New York’s 33rd annual Emerging Voices award - one of the most coveted awards in North American architecture. Each recipient was selected for being a “distinct design voice” with the “potential to influence" disciplines of architecture, landscape architecture, and urbanism.
“This year’s Voices critically re-envision solutions for contemporary design concerns—programmatic, typological, and tectonic—that have the potential to inspire new approaches to building and form,” says program director Anne Rieselbach.
This year’s emerging voices are…
Biomimicry is quickly emerging as one of the next architectural frontiers. New manufacturing processes such as 3D printing, coupled with the drive to make buildings more environmentally sustainable, have led to a wave of projects that are derived from natural phenomena or even constructed with biological materials. A recent example of this trend is “Hy-Fi,” this summer’s MoMA PS1 design that is constructed of organic and compostable eco-bricks. Other projects such as MIT Media Lab’s Silk Pavilion have taken biological innovation a step further by actually using a biometric construction processes - around 6,500 silkworms wove the Silk Pavilion's membrane. “Animal Printheads,” as Geoff Manaugh calls them in his article "Architecture-By-Bee and Other Animal Printheads," have already proven to be a viable part of the manufacturing process in art, and perhaps in the future, the built environment as well. But what happens when humans engineer animals to 3D print other materials?
