Tag: architecture

DS10 2023-2024 BRIEF

ECO-PARAMETRIC ARCHITECTURE: 

MATERIAL BASED RITUALS AND ECONOMIES

We are back! 10 Year as DS10 (Diploma Studio 10). We STILL Want To Learn. Join our studio at University of Westminster with Toby Burgess and Arthur Mamou-Mani. This year we will be looking at Temples and Sacred Spaces, using A.I. and Parametric tools, fusing nature and architecture in London’s discarded office buildings.

LINK TO INTRODUCTION A4

LINK TO PRESENTATION

LINK TO VIDEO PRESENTATION

Temple Galaxia 2018, Burning Man
“It may well be that foragers switched from gathering wild wheat to intense wheat cultivation, not to increase their normal food supply, but rather to support the building and running of temples.”
Yuval Noah Harari, Sapiens

Wincy Wong’s 3D printed Chicken Bone London Community
(Awarded Best Diploma Project 2022)

Psychedelic Sanatorium

Spiritual healing and air filtration in one. A psilocybin farm, and research centre for alternative healthcare. The core links between psilocybin and mental health are the psychedelic properties which increase human connectivity to nature, while nature is proven to be the original remedy for mental wellbeing. The project enhances this connection by providing a mushroom ecosystem with the creation of a microclimate from natural larch logs. The same structural logic is used for breathing pods, filtering air through the use of moss, enhancing the spiritual healing properties.

The Breathing Pods

The breathing pods are bio-machines focused on creating a natural solution to the issue of pollution within large cities. Continuing the aim of City Tree walls placed around London: the pods offer an architectural and natural rendition inspired by AI generated Midjourney images. A single pod is a semi-enclosed space created from structural wooden logs placed in a circular motion: depending on one another to hold themselves up. Moss growth in its natural habitat and wind velocity created through the gaps within the logs make 1 breathing pod equal to the air filtration of up to 600 urban trees during high wind levels.

OYSTER SHELLEBRATION

The project aims to design a food consumption system that produce zero waste by turning oyster shells into calcium oxide. The calcined shells can be made into oyster-crete as the building material of the bar, and other calcium-related products such as chicken supplements, etc. The business plan can therefore subsidise the procurement of oysters and provide affordable oysters for the lower classes in the neighbourhood.

Subscription Living in Modular Architecture – Derelict London

In Brief01 proposal a series of WeBreathe working pods acted as a scalable product under WeWork either on a subscription basis or one-off time. In Brief02 I looked at the new subscription economy and how it can help some of the issues we face in London, other than air pollution, such as the housing crisis, changing labour markets and the need to create a professional network/ecosystem for young professionals.

Subscription and pay-as-you-go businesses are undermining an idea that has been entrenched in our collective psyche since the foundation of capitalism: that you have to own something to use it and enjoy it. As noted in a report by The Economist, “80% of customers are demanding new consumption models including subscribing, sharing and leasing – anything except buying a product outright.”

The Subscription Model

Relevant examples leading to the subscription model include ROAM which is a worldwide community of co-living and co-working and PodShare with multiple locations in Los Angeles.

The motivations of building a subscription community are:

  • Build a community situated amongst contemporary models of subscription living
  • Fostering knowledge and skill exchange between different age and social groups to encourage mutually beneficial relationships within an urban setting

Ecopod – A.I. Meets Architecture

To explore the intersection of artificial
intelligence and architecture, I’m using tools
such as Midjourney to generate A.I. powered
architectural prototypes. These prototypes
are expanded into parametric models using
Grasshopper3D, allowing me to create novel
and inhabited spaces that integrate living
elements such as plants, trees, and soils. Our
focus this year is on using A.I. in the design process and
linking it to specific industrial manufacturing
techniques such as CNC.

Imagine Airbnb and WeWork combined. You get
to own or rent an existing private pod as a space
to work in. This structure is fully off-grid, sustainably
heated and cooled using heat pumps which
extract water from the canal. Ecopods are located near canals as
their primary source of energy production uses
the canal water. It also comes with a good view.