SmartGeometry 2009 Revisited

This article is co-published with Archinect

The 6th annual SmartGeometry workshop and conference were held in March 2009 in San Francisco with Bentley Systems, (makers of MicroStation and new parametric software GenerativeComponents) as the principal sponsor. GenerativeComponents (known as GC), is a software originally created by architect Robert Aish, a founding member of SmartGeometry who is now at Autodesk.  Unlike Catia for automotive or aerospace engineering or Maya for the animation industry, GC is a parametric software that has been designed for architecture.  GC is a flexible design environment that can be linked to other software and is designed to be used both as a digital sketching tool for early design development and as a production tool.

The Workshops

The ‘students’ who were selected for a place at the four-day SmartGeometry workshops are researchers, students and tutors from schools of architecture in North America, Europe and Australia as well as practitioners from various International architecture and engineering practices.  Some attended a 2 day crash course in GC preceding the conference to familiarize themselves with the software, although many had learned it on their own or through the SmartGeometry community, which holds trainings sessions at various universities. 

Each student came to the conference with an architectural design project to work on during the course of the four days.  The scale and scope of works ranged widely, from designs for parametric acoustics as seen in the works of Kirsten Verboven and Tim de Pessemier at University of Ghent, to a project concerned with digital craftsmanship by Martin Tamke at CITA in Copenhagen. Erica Swesey Savig from University of Pennsylvania investigated biology and the potentials of life-like interfaces for architecture. A highlight was the work by Flora Salim at RMIT in Melbourne which was a project that hooked up Wii-motes to parametric software enabling 3D drawing and other interactive experiments.

Cincinnati based student Devin Jernigan’s ‘Regenerating Tower’ project uses data from the US Environmental Protection Agency identifying dirty waste points in NYC. The points themselves are proposed as sensors for the city, which determine highest density regions where cleansing “seed” towers could formulate to store, clean, and redistribute the waste material, acting as a local ecological contact with the city.

The work of Kevin Van Hauwaert from University of Ghent was concerned with mass customization and new rapid manufacturing technologies.  Van Hauwaert created computer scripts using Generative Components to control a building-sized 3D printer, part of his ongoing collaboration with Loughborough University.

Aiming for innovation rather than incrementally improving the efficiency of their designs, the students seemed to delight in making software do what they wanted it to do, not for what it was intended.  The students created their own custom tools (GC is a good tool-making device) and created interfaces with other software as required, rather than being guided by what could be done easily in one platform. 

The students had access during the workshops to a ‘Fablab’ with 3D printers and laser cutters so that they could output their digital ideas to prototypes.  The students could test their designs in a 3D print, and then come back a few hours later to make another version, using the technologies as tools for critically testing their ideas.

Alumni Summit and Conference Day

After the workshops, the Alumni Summit gives attendees a unique insiders look into in-progress professional and academic work mainly by the SmartGeometry core members. These young international lecturers and practitioners include Jenny Sabin from University of Pennsylvania, Steve Sanderson from CASE Inc, Axel Killian from TU Delft, and Mirco Becker from KPF.

The final day of SmartGeometry was the Conference day, where the SmartGeometry directors introduced a selection of speakers ranging from Brett Steele from the Architectural Association School in London to David Kasik from Boeing to several presentations about sustainability, notably from Judit Kimpian of Aedas and Jim McBride from Makani Power.  Kimpian, together with colleague Josh Mason of Aedas and Jeroen Coenders from Arup presented collaborative research about sustainability with regard to tall buildings.  McBride gave a non-architectural perspective about sustainability, with regard to personal energy consumption and accountability featuring experimental research into giant energy generating turbine planes.

But ‘Parametrics’ was the word of the day.  The word was used so often that Chris Williams from the University of Bath joked that “Do You Believe in Parametrics?” sounded like an obscure theological question.  Williams says he’s not sure if he is a ‘believer’, but he reveals he does believe in design and optimization. Williams’s presentation featured classic cars and an alternative pre-digital history of parametric design including his own collaborations with Frei Otto.

A highlight of the conference day was architect Mark Burry’s presentation of his work on Gaudi’s unfinished masterpiece Sagrada Familia.  Burry has been working on the project for 30 years (!).  Burry works with parametric design and modeling, large scale rapid prototype models, laser cut shuttering for concrete, and a shared 3D model which generates the plans for fabrication. He uses a seven-axis robot operated by the Spanish stone mason who has been involved with the project ‘since the beginning’.

Conclusions

What seems apparent from presentations at the Alumni Summit and the Conference Day is that in practice, architects are using many types of digital tools over the course of a single project.  The future of CAD seems to be in software links and custom scripts, not in the development of a single, multi-tasking CAD package. A designer could start with Ecotect, add a bit of Rhino VB script, then a little bit of Visual Studio or Generative Components and then output to both Autocad and MicroStation due to the various functionality of both.

In this uncertain economic climate, with (all?) high profile architectural projects ‘on hold’, there is little doubt that understanding at least the potentials –if not the specifics—of parametric design is a useful design skill.  The annual SmartGeometry conference is particularly relevant because it is about research and practice, combing theory and practical experience.  Students of architecture graduating now know they need to have quality examples of their digital skills in order have a competitive CV.  This is changing the way schools teach design and technology.  In the last five years many schools of architecture have extended their workshop facilities to include laser cutters and 3D printers and there seems to be an expensive game of one-upmanship with ever increasing complexity in multi-axis robot milling machines. The two new robots at Harvard’s GSD may be 6 axis robots, but the TU Vienna has a 7 axis machine, and ETH Zurich has an 8 axis robot.

But when do architecture students find the time and expertise to learn how to program robots?  Increasingly it is not unusual for students to ‘pick up’ computer programming and environmental analysis software like Ecotect in their first few years of study.  And those in practice know that rapid prototyping is becoming commonplace in many design offices, although many send out the work rather than have facilities in house.  A parametric 3D model can be used to test multiple options efficiently to make sure clients are getting value for money in terms of design and building performance and it can be a way of controlling accuracy.

SmartGeometry is a unique educational resource (crucially well funded by industry) that is succeeding in creating a network of forward looking architects interested in new technologies, and this may be what keeps the industry competitive in these bleak economic times.  Adding design and efficiency options to the architect’s toolkit can be a way of making complex designs buildable.  Parametric design may not be for everyone (luckily, as these workshop participants would say, as they faced stiff competition for these coveted workshop spots) or for every project, but it is undeniably changing the way many buildings are being designed and the way new architects are being educated.  So, as Chris Williams would say, “Do you believe in parametrics?”