The Evolutionary Dynamics of Sentience in Cities

Cities, and their component buildings and infrastructural systems, have developed rapidly in responsive and adaptive capacities. Ubiquitous computation and new informational technologies are increasingly embedded in the physical and social processes of the city. Here, Michael Weinstock identifies ‘sentience’, or the ability to be aware, as the primary driver of innovation in the urban environment; as the extended ‘nervous system’ of a city develops the potential to sense changes in the city's flows, and in its internal and external environments.     

Parametric Patterns

For Patrik Schumacher of Zaha Hadid Architects, articulation is the central core competency of architecture; and designed patterns provide one of the most potent devices for architectural articulation. Schumacher ushers in a new era of parametric architecture in which pattern becomes an innovative and powerful register of articulation, providing amplification of surface difference and correlation, ultimately resulting in dynamic, high-performance ornamentation.     

Materialising Complexity

The specialist practice designtoproduction consults on the digital production of complex architectural designs. Here, co-founder Fabian Scheurer charts the relatively recent journey that architecture has taken from the regular to the irregular. He provides a comprehensive account of how this shift to curvilinear and complex forms has impacted on design and production methods, and the strengths and pitfalls of parametric design and CNC fabrication. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Parametricism: A New Global Style for Architecture and Urban Design

Though parametricism has its roots in the digital animation techniques of the mid-1990s, it has only fully emerged in recent years with the development of advanced parametric design systems. Patrik Schumacher explains why parametricism has become the dominant, single style for avant-garde practice today and why it is particularly suited to large-scale urbanism as exemplified by a series of competition-winning masterplans by Zaha Hadid Architects. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Entrepreneurship in Architectural Robotics: The Simultaneity of Craft,Economics and Design

What do Odico Formwork Robotics, RoboFold, Machineous, ROB Technologies and GREYSHED share in common? They are all architectural robotics startups. Jelle Feringa , Chief Technology Officer at Odico, places the phenomenon of the architectural robotics entrepreneur in a historical and cultural context while highlighting the very practical role startups are poised to play in bridging the gap between academic research and industry, by providing the building industry with much needed new software tools.     

Fabricating Elegance: Digital Architecture's Coming of Age

For Joseph Rosa, John H Bryan Curator of Architecture at the Institute of Chicago, elegance with its ‘refined aesthetic ability’ represents a concurrent maturing of design culture and technologies. It builds on the pioneering fabrication techniques of the late 1990s, spearheaded in seminal projects such as the Korean Presbyterian Church in New York by Greg Lynn, Douglas Garofalo and Michael McInturf, and the Yokohama Port Terminal by Foreign Office Architects. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Upgrading Computational Design

Shajay Bhooshan heads up the computation and design ZHACODE group at Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA) and is a course master at the Architectural Association Design Research Laboratory (AADRL). Here he argues that Parametricism 2.0 has a vital role to play in the progressing of computational design. Assimilating the exploratory developments of the last 15 years, he asserts how the next phase of Parametricism will enable a further consolidation and evolution of digital practices.     

Inventing the Rural: A Brief History of Modern Architecture in the Countryside

The rural has long occupied a valuable, if under-theorised position in modern architectural history. Here, Cole Roskam , Assistant Professor of Architectural History at the University of Hong Kong, highlights key moments in this history and, in doing so, illuminates a central paradox at the heart of architecture's various turns to the countryside; namely, can architects maintain the physical and social integrity of the rural when they are themselves a fundamental vector of its changing character?