Material Systems: Digital Design and Fabrication

The translation between architectural design and the subsequent actualization process is mediated by various tools and techniques that allow design teams, fabricators and installers to engage the materiality of architecture. Over the past decade advances in material development have been catalyzed by increasingly robust implementations of digital design and fabrication techniques that have empowered designers through digital modeling, simulation, and the increasingly digital augmentation of all physical processes. Creative applications of material related technologies have produced new forms of expression in architecture, triggered a debate on digital ornament, and continue to advance the performative aspects of buildings. Yet we are only at the beginning of a new age of digital materiality…

The course positions material systems as combinations of design technologies with material processing and manipulation environments. Material systems are positioned as central to a research based design enquiry that capitalizes on opportunities that emerge when craft-based knowledge is synthesized with CNC-machines, robotic technologies, additive manufacturing and material science. This year’s course will focus on ceramic systems and includes a collaboration with the Harvard Ceramics Studio in Allston (consultant: Kathy King). The course builds on years of collaborative research by the Material Processes and Systems (MaP+S) group at the GSD. Ceramics is the first ever material created by mankind – it is omnipresent in the craft-studio as well as in high-volume manufacturing environments. Pleasing to the touch and easily manipulated by hand, it can just as easily be subject to digital technologies and robotic approaches. While ceramic-specific aspects of material design and manipulation will be taught emphasis is on understanding ceramics as a microcosm of material research that offers insights which transfer to work with almost any material used in architecture.

The course is offered as an open enrollment lecture/workshop that includes weekly lectures, discussions and hands-on workshops. Lectures includes a historic overview of material systems, fundamentals of fabrication and manufacturing, strategic customization, digital and physical prototyping, digital simulation, introduction to robotic systems, introduction to product development, production economics and other topics. Selected readings of book chapters and papers will supplement topics taught in class. Students will be introduced to a range of digital fabrication and robotic systems and their related software environments and digital techniques. We might venture on some local field trips to understand the practical aspects of fabrication in a range of materials…

The technical and systems knowledge imparted in the class will be complemented by the teaching of research methods in the technology area, through a combination of readings and writing exercises. Students will be proposing and working on a research-based ceramics project throughout the semester, culminating in a substantial experimental prototype and a conference-level paper that frames the project as an instance of design technology research in ceramic material systems.

The course is supported by a grant from ASCER Tile of Spain. We plan on exhibiting all student work in a show at the Allston Ceramics Studio at the beginning of 2018. A selection of project will also be shown at the 2018 CEVISAMA in Valencia, Spain.