Society. Spaces. Screens

Abstract

Technological democratization is breaking down barriers between creativity and technical skill, with tools like Apple’s Garage Band and Unity enabling users to create music and 3D worlds without specialized training. In architectural education, Autodesk’s Fusion 360 brings a similar shift, making advanced structural simulation tools accessible to students, allowing direct engagement with engineering concepts. Through the lens of Affordance Theory, Fusion 360 illustrates how features like real-time feedback and interactive modeling afford students hands-on exploration of structural forces. Vivid “heat maps” and color-coded feedback transform structural analysis from a “cold” medium of abstract calculations to a “hot,” interactive learning experience. This study examines this transformation within architectural education, where structures courses are typically separate from design, limiting students’ integration of form, function, and technology. Fusion 360’s tools—including T-splines and topology optimization—enhance structural learning in studio projects. T-splines enable intuitive shaping of complex geometries, while topology optimization reveals where material can be reduced for efficiency. Moving through a workflow of T-spline modeling and strategic mass reduction, students designed a structural spatial spanning enclosure for a multimodal transport station, using “heat maps” to develop heuristics for structural efficiency and spatial porosity. This process shifts structural education from passive, “cold” methods to an interactive, “hot” medium where students directly experience structural forces. Findings suggest that democratized tools like Fusion 360 can redefine architectural pedagogy, blending aesthetic and technical learning and creating engaging pathways for students to explore engineering concepts.