AD Smart

Those working in architecture and engineering feel pressure to work faster, at lower cost, while maintaining a high level of innovation and quality. At the same time, emergent tools and processes make this possible. Convergence is about the firms, teams and people who thrive in this environment as a result of their ability to creatively combine and innovate. It seeks to answer several timely questions: What are the tools and work processes that are converging? How are individuals and organizations converging their tools and work processes? What challenges and benefits are they seeing? What is the ultimate endgame of this convergence? What skillsets and mindsets would someone need to develop to work effectively in this changing environment? What are the implications of convergence on the role of the designer, and on design? On how we design, build, fabricate, and construct? On how we work? The book explains how convergence relates to, but ultimately differs from integration, consolidation, multi-tasking, automation, and other forms of optimization. The practice-based research builds upon the author's research in BIM and in the collaborative leveraging of data in design and fabrication. As an investigation and meditation on the impact of technology on the education and making of design professionals Convergence explains what is happening in the world of design, and discusses the implications for the future of education, training and practice.

The contents of the book will highlight the differences between the design and engineering disciplines — strengths and flaws. It will also illustrate examples of interdisciplinary interactions. Any false dichotomies will be revealed and the many non-linear processes borne out of challenging conventions between traditional and new modes of practice will be revealed. Projects based on a body of experience spanning many years will be selected to support experimentation that goes beyond an undisciplined search for originality, innovation and creativity. In addition to writings from Hanif Kara and Daniel Bosia contributions will be sought from specialists in the field who have played a role in the operations of P.art® at AKT II — past and present — qualifying them to disseminate and distribute a particular form of 'knowledge'. • Features work of architectural practices: Adjaye Associates, Foster + Partners, Heatherwick Studio, HOK, Serie Architects, Wilkinson Eyre Architects and Zaha Hadid Architects. • In addition to AKT II, it will encompass the work of engineers and engineering consultants such as: Arup, Cecil Balmond, Buckminster Fuller, Buro Happold, Pier Luigi Nervi and Peter Rice.

Smartgeometry (SG) is a key influence on the architectural community who explore creative computational methods for the design of buildings. An informal international network of practitioners and researchers, the group meets annually to experiment with new technologies and collaborate to develop digital design techniques. When SG was founded in 2001 by London-based architects and friends Hugh Whitehead (Foster + Partners), J Parrish (AECOM) and Lars Hesselgren (PLP), there was little in the way of parametric tools for architecture. SG was founded to encourage the development, discussion and experimentation of digital design techniques driven by design intent rather than on construction specifications. SG calls for a re-consideration of the design process, where the creation of computational mechanisms become an integral part of designing—not a task done prior to or separate from the process. In the early years of the workshops this need for new ways of design thinking led to the development of Bentley's GenerativeComponents software. In recent years, the ecology of these design environments has diversified to include multiple software platforms, as well as innovative fabrication techniques and interactive environments. SG has grown accordingly from a handful of experts to an international network of designers who are defining the future of design. Founded by digital pioneers, it creates the algorithmic designers of the future. Inside Smartgeometry can be seen as a retroactive manifesto for SG, examining and contextualising the work of the SG community: the digital spaces, prototypes and buildings designed using bespoke tools created in response to architectural ideas. From interactive crowd-sourcing tools to responsive agent-based systems to complex digitally fabricated structures, it explores more than a decade of advances that have been influential for architecture. Through 23 original texts including reflections by the founders, and key contributors such as Robert Aish, Martin Bechthold, Mark Burry, Chris Williams and Robert Woodbury, the book offers a critical state of the art of computational design for architecture. Many international design and engineering firms have participated in SG and the book includes chapters by practitioners from offices such as CASE, Design2Production, Foster + Partners, Grimshaw, Populous and SOM.

Today's design professionals are faced with challenges on all fronts. They need not only to keep in step with rapid technological changes and the current revolution in design and construction processes, but to lead the industry. This means actively seeking to innovate through design research, raising the bar in building performance and adopting advanced technologies in their practice. In a constant drive to improve design processes and services, how is it possible to implement innovations? And, moreover, to assimilate them in such a way that design, methods and technologies remain fully integrated? Focusing on innovations in architecture, this book covers new materials and design methods, advances in computational design practices, innovations in building technologies and construction techniques, and the integration of research with design. Moreover, it discusses strategies for integrating innovation into design practices, risks and economic impacts. Through numerous case studies, it illustrates how innovations have been implemented on actual architectural projects, and how design and technical innovations are used to improve building performance, as well as design practices in cutting-edge architectural and engineering firms. Projects of all scales and building types are discussed in the book, ranging from small-scale installations, academic and commercial buildings to large-scale mixed-use, healthcare, civic, academic, scientific research and sports facilities. Work from design firms around the globe and of various scales is discussed in the book, including for example Asymptote Architecture, cepezed, CO Architects, Consarc Architects, FAAB Architektura, Gerber Architekten, HOK, IDOM-ACXT, MAD Architects, Morphosis Architects, SDA Synthesis Design + Architecture, Studiotrope, Perkins+Will, Richter Dahl Rocha & Associés, Snøhetta, Rob Ley Studio, Trahan Architects, UNStudio and Zaha Hadid Architects, among many others.

Building information modelling (BIM) is revolutionising building design and construction. For architects, BIM has the potential to optimise their creativity while reducing risk in the design and construction process, thus giving them a more significant role in the building process. This book demonstrates how innovative firms are using BIM technologies to move design away from the utilitarian problems of construction, engaging them in a stunning new future in the built environment. Whereas recent books about BIM have tended to favour case-study analyses or instruction on the use of specific software, BIM Design highlights how day-to-day design operations are shaped by the increasingly generative and collaborative aspects of these new tools. BIM strategies are described as operations that can enhance design rather than simply make it more efficient. Thus, this book focuses on the specific creative uses of information modelling at the operational level, including the creative development of parametric geometries and generative design, the evaluation of environmental performance and the simulation and scheduling of construction/fabrication operations. This book also engages BIM's pragmatic efficiencies such as the conflict checking of building systems and the creation of bills of quantities for costing; and in so doing it demonstrates how BIM can make such activities collaborative. Throughout, projects are used to illustrate the creative application of BIM at a variety of scales. These buildings showcase work by fi rms executing projects all over the world: SHoP Architects and Construction (New York), Morphosis (Los Angeles), Populous (London), GRO Architects (New York), Reiser + Umemoto (New York), Gensler (Shanghai) and UNStudio (Amsterdam).

“Computing the Environment” presents practical workflows and guidance for designers to get feedback on their design using digital design tools on environmental performance. Starting with an extensive state-of-the-art survey of what top international offices are currently using in their design projects, this book presents detailed descriptions of the tools, algorithms, and workflows used and discusses the theories that underlie these methods. Project examples from Transsolar Klimaengineering, Buro Happold's SMART Group, Behnish Behnisch Architects, Thomas Herzog, Autodesk Research are contextualized with quotes and references to key thinkers in this field such as Eric Winsberg, Andrew Marsh, Michelle Addington and Ali Malkawi.