"Machanikus ter biologiai ido"

Article by A Bak, Balkon Magazine issue No. 10, October 2008

"Space is extremely real"

Related Interview by A Bak, October 2008

AB: Architects like Greg Lynn or Marcos Novak also proposed that time, motion and the concept of a dynamic environment can be introduced into architecture with computer-aided tools. They apply these ideas mainly to the design process, whereas you go further than that.

TS: Greg Lynn and Marcos Novak are really great. I like their work and I actually had a master class with Greg back in 1997 - so I guess you could say that I don't just like what they do but I have been shaped by it. Greg's works speak of motion and of responding (in real time) to a context, to nature and people. Greg Lynn built a career on doing exactly this type of work. He called it "animate" architecture and his theory and methods had strong overtones of the forgotten participatory design movement. His work was excellent but it lost its dynamism when it was caught in freeze frame and built. My work - ORAMBRA's work - seeks to address a major division that exists between the digital design of these buildings and their built realization. ORAMBRA does this by integrating computation into the fabric of buildings and structures to produce buildings that can, quite literally change shape. These responsive structures and skins give architecture the means to transform fluid ideas into fluid built forms. So you might say that our work begins to addresses the divide between the digital and the physical worlds, but it isn't just a response to this. We don't aim to only speak to the contemporary discourse of fluid natural forms. Our work tackles many of the environmental problems that our societies now face.

AB: How?

TS: Let's paint a picture of the conventional building as a box with a roof, windows, walls and doors. The long-held view of architecture as a static entity lends itself to this vision. In order to make these unchanging boxes comfortable from winter to summer, architects and engineers have devised a series of systems that get woven through the building to air condition it, to heat it and light it. Now consider this picture against what nature does to withstand the seasons: trees drop their leaves to lessen the snow loads of winter; flowers and plants follow the sun to control their temperature, evaporation and photosynthesis. Birds draw in their wings to change shape when they wish to accelerate. The one common thread to all of these examples is that nature has worked out a way to use shape change to control performance and behavior.

Architects and their buildings are quite dumb in this respect. Static, box-like forms only work when they are filled with myriads of systems that compensate for the building's inability to alter its performance through the shape and properties of its skin. We must produce buildings whose structures can change their shape and form according to the wind loads and our desire for fresh air inside; while their skins moderate and adjust to provide day-lighting and shade. This approach is very much an emergent one where the building itself adapts to an environment and users to produce forms that are beyond the control of the architect author. We must simultaneously produce ultra-lightweight buildings that use far fewer material and energy resources in construction. Such buildings are necessary for society to overcome the significant environmental challenges now faced.

Balkon Magazine (Budapest)
>> by Bak A "Mechanikus ter biologiiai ido" #10 October 2008