Description: Although digital fabrication has allowed architects and designers to explore more complex geometries, one of the byproducts has been a lack of attention to material waste. Often digitally fabricated projects are generated from a top-down logic with the parameters of typical material sheet sizes being subordinated to the end of the design process. This project attempts to reverse that logic by starting from the basic material dimensions and then generating a series of components that will minimize material waste during CNC cutting while still producing an undulating, light-filtering screen in the gallery.

Photo by Kory Bieg

Photo by Andy Payne

Curation diagram

Photo by Kory Bieg

Photo by Kory Bieg

Photo by Kory Bieg

Photo by Kory Bieg

Photo by Andy Payne

Photo by Andy Payne

Photo by Andy Payne

Photo by Kory Bieg

Prototype Model

Grasshopper Definition by Andy Payne

Year: 2009
Location: California College of the Arts, San Francisco

Description: FLUX: Architecture in a Parametric Landscape by CCA Architecture/MEDIAlab is an exhibition that focuses on the emerging field of advanced digital design. In the last two decades of architectural practice, new digital technologies have evolved from being simply representational tools invested in the depiction of existing models of architectural space to becoming significant performative machines that have transformed the ways in which we both conceive and configure space and material. These tools for design, simulation, and fabrication, have enabled the emergence of new digital diagrams and parametric landscapes—often emulating genetic and iterative dynamic evolutionary processes—that are not only radically changing the ways in which we integrate disparate types of information into the design process, but are also significantly altering the methodological strategies that we use for design, fabrication and construction. After the early digital explosion of the 1990’s, new forms of rigor and production have entered into the field of architecture, supporting the emergence of parametric and building information modeling and the enhanced use of computational geometry and scripting that together represent the second critical wave of digital design practices. That our current models of space are far more continuous, variant and complex, is specifically a result of the tools we are using to produce them, an inevitable byproduct of the ever-expanding capacities of digital computation and related fabrication technologies as these intersect with theoretical trajectories that long ago dismantled the social, functional and technological truths of the early part of this century.

The FLUX exhibition was generated in conjunction with this year’s CCA Architecture Lecture Series focused on the integration of digital practices and design, CCA MEDIAlab’s digital workshops and the International Smart Geometry conference held in San Francisco in the spring of 2009. The content of the exhibition is organized through a series of thematic categories each of which explores a set of spatial logics that have been transformed through advanced digital practices: Stacked Aggregates, Modular Assemblages, Pixelated Fields, Cellular Clusters, Serial Iterations, Woven Meshes, Material Systems, and Emergent Environments. In this exhibit, these themes are elaborated through the presentation of 50 built works and experimental architectural projects, and are expanded by analytical diagrams and 3D printed models generated by CCA architecture students.

The FLUX installation, developed by a team of CCA faculty and students, also explores the possibilities of parametric modeling and digital fabrication through the production of the exhibition armature. Produced using CCA’s new CNC router and advanced parametric modeling techniques, the undulating structure expands and contracts as its volume extends down the center of the long nave space. Through the use of parametric modeling and a series of custom designed scripts, the installation design can be quickly updated to address new design criteria. From the thickness of the ribs to the overall twisting geometry and perforated skins, the spatial form of the armature is controlled through a complex set of relationships defined by its formal, performative, and fabrication constraints.

Official Credits
Architect: CCA Architecture/MEDIAlab
Location: San Francisco, United States
Date: 2008 – 2009

The FLUX installation, developed over 6 months by a team of CCA faculty and students, explores the possibilities of parametric modeling and digital fabrication at CCA. Produced using CCA’s brand new CNC router and advanced parametric modeling techniques, the structure undulates in plan and section producing a sense of expansion and contraction in the long Nave space. Through the use of parametric modeling and a series of custom designed scripts, the installation design can be quickly updated to address new design criteria. From the thickness of the ribs to the overall twisting geometry and perforated skins, the geometry is controlled through a complex set of relationships between its formal, performative, and fabrication constraints.

Director of Architecture: Ila Berman
Project Coordinator and Director of the MEDIAlab: Andrew Kudless
Installation Design: Kory Bieg, Andre Caradec, Andrew Kudless, Ila Berman
Exhibition Curation: Andrew Kudless with Ila Berman and Marc Fornes
Graphic Design Assistants: Jessica Gibson, Andy Payne, Melissa Spooner
Parametric Design Consultant: Andy Payne
Installation Team: Laurice der Bedrossian, Yoon Choi, Stephanie Close, Loi Dinh, David Garcia, Jessica Gibson, John Hobart-Culleton, Charlotte Hofstetter, Madaline Honig, Wayne Lin, Sandra Lopez, Mariko Low, Jen Melendez, Michelle Mucker, Andrew Peters, Jason Rhein, Ocean Rogoff, Angela Todorova, Dianne de la Torre, Michael Victoria, Olesya Yefimov
Graphic Design, Modeling and Scripting Team: Olutobi Adamolekun, Lynn Bayer, Ripon DeLeon, Anthony Diaz, Alexa Getting, Jessica Gibson, Noah Greer, Benjamin Harth, Madeline Honig, Elizabeth Jackson, Pouya Khakpour, Anna Leach, Ryan Lee, Charles Ma, David Manzanares Garcia, Ariane Mates, Andy Payne, Harsha Pelimuhandiram, Michael Perkins, Javier Rodriguez, Ricardo Ruiz, Melissa Spooner, Jessica Stuenkel, Vladimir Vlad, Duncan Young
Sponsors: SolidThinking, K Bieg Design, SUM Arch, Vogue Graphics
CNC Fabrication Support: Ryan Buyssens, Jo Slota
Consultation: Chris Chalmers, Andrew Sparks

At the event. Photo: Craig Scott

Video projections by Chris Larson

Branching points at balconies

Plan

Early renderings of design

Year: 2008
Location: Berkeley Art Museum

Description: From artists such as Naum Gabo to architects such as Antoni Gaudi, Felix Candela, and Frei Otto, the geometric entity known as a hyperbolic paraboloid has emerged as something that is both formally evocative and easily constructible. Although composed of only straight lines, the hyperbolic paraboloid traces a complexly curved surface. For this installation, the central space of the Berkeley Art Museum is tied together with a series of HyPar surfaces that emerge from the upper levels and then bifurcate at each balcony, framing a series of video projections.

The installation was created to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Matrix, the contemporary art department of the Berkeley Art Museum. Although it was only commissioned for a one-night party on April 25, 2008, the curators of the museum decided to keep it up for a few months. The installation consists of around 15,000′ of nylon rope, 4 steel frames, 4 laser-cut acrylic column braces (affectionately knowns as the “armadillos”), and 4 amazing videos created by Chris Lael Larson of Natural Lighting in Portland.

Design and Fabrication
Andrew Kudless of Matsys

Design Collaborators
Lisa Iwamoto and Craig Scott of IwamotoScott

Steel Fabrication
Joel Hirschfeld of Hirschfeld Fabrications

Motion Graphics Design
Chris Lael larson of Natural-Lighting.com

Engineering Consultation
Andrew Sparks

Installation Team
Michael Chang
John Kim
Thien Mac
Pia-Jacqlyn Malinis
Ashley Matsu
Natsuki Matsumoto
Plamena Milusheva
Azadeh Omidfar
Colleen Paz
Aaron Poritz
Eleanor Pries

Physical prototype by Cook + Fox

Digital prototype: natural light

Digital prototype: artifical light

Digital prototype: night lighting

Labeling system for prototype

Ceiling plan of built prototype

Unrolled cells for laser-cutting

Early design prototypes

Early Design Prototypes: Scripts were created for each scenario for design team exploration and testing

Early Design Prototypes: Fabrication issues

Early Design Prototype: Fabrication diagram

Early Design Prototype: Plan of Scheme 5

Early Design Prototype: Section through Scheme 05

Year: 2007
Location: New York

Description: Matsys provided computational design consulting for Cook + Fox on this project. The project was sited in the lobby of a fashion designer’s studio in a Manhattan tower. The design team needed tools to help them model, visualize, and fabricate their design. Matsys created several rhinoscripts that could be used by the design team to iteratively explore their design concept.

View from outside the gallery door

C_Wall with shadows on floor

The zigzag plan of the wall creates an increased structural stiffness

Dense pattern of shadows

Process diagram

Year: 2006
Location: Banvard Gallery, Knowlton School of Architecture, Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio
Size: 12′ x 4′ x 8′

Description: This project is the latest development in an ongoing area of research into cellular aggregate structures that has examined honeycomb and voronoi geometries and their ability to produce interesting structural, thermal, and visual performances. The voronoi algorithm is used in a wide range of fields including satellite navigation, animal habitat mapping, and urban planning as it can easily adapt to local contingent conditions. Within our research, it is used as a tool to facilitate the translation and materialization of data from particle-simulations and other point-based data. Through this operation, points are transformed into volumetric cells which can be unfolded, CNC cut, and reassembled into larger aggregates.

Credits: Andrew Kudless and Ivan Vukcevich with Ryan Palider, Zak Snider, Austin Poe, Camie Vacha, Cassie Matthys, Christopher Friend, Nicholas Cesare, Anthony Rodriguez, Mark Wendell, Joel Burke, Brandon Hendrick, Chung-tzu Yeh, Doug Stechschultze, Gene Shevchenko, Kyu Chun, Nick Munoz, and Sabrina Sierawski, and Ronnie Parsons

Manifold Installation at the AA Projects Review 2004, Photo: Francis Ware

Variable transparency of the wall

Detail of Manifold

Floor detail of Manifold Installation

Manifold Installation

Manifold Installation rendering

Cut files for Manifold

Manifold Installation process

Honeycomb prototypes

Honeycomb Prototype detail

Honeycomb Prototype exploring cell depth and curvature parametric link

Plaster form-finding model

Plaster form-finding model

Date: 2004
Location: London, UK
Description: This research was pursued as part of a MA dissertation in Emergent Technologies and Design at the Architectural Association. The central aim of the research is the development of a material system with a high degree of integration between its design and performance. This integration is inherent to natural material systems for they have been developed through evolutionary means which intricately tie together the form, growth, and behavior of the organism. In industrial material systems, the level of integration is far lower resulting in wide and potentially problematic gaps between its means of production, its geometric and material definition, and its environmental performance. This research explores integration strategies for a particular industrially produced material system for use in architectural applications.
This research develops a honeycomb system that is able to adapt to diverse performance requirements through the modulation of the system’s inherent geometric and material parameters while remaining within the limits of available production technologies. The Honeycomb Morphologies Project is based on the desire to form an integrated and generative design strategy using a biomimetic approach to architectural design and fabrication.
The system developed in this research presents an open framework through which the designer can work, enabling a more integral relationship between the various conflicting and overlapping issues in the development of an architectural project. The research represents a tool, waiting to be actively used with specific project data and embedded in a built artifact.
The Manifold installation was a large scale prototype constructed for the AA 2004 Projects Review. The installation explored the research developed in the Honeycomb Morphologies Project and extended it to a more architectural scale.
Credits: Andrew Kudless with help from Jayendra Sha, Nikolaos Stathopoulos, Giorgos Kailis, Matthew Johnson, Ranidia Lemon, Muchuan Xu, Grace Li, Scott Cahill, and Wongpat Suetrong.

C_Tower Elevation

C_Tower Plans: Plan ocillates between 3 sides and 12 sides

Year: 2004
Location: London

Description: This short (1-day) research project explores the use of large scale cellular structures in the design of towers. The tower is built up from a series of cells, each spanning 15 floors. The nature of each cell is to expand horizontally as load is applied. This force is countered by tension in the floor plates. The facade is composed of two types of cells, one of no curvature and one of single curvature. A parametric model was produced to explore the rotation, height, and size of floors.