Representing Pasts – Visioning Futures

Abstract

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This paper looks at the development of digital geometries in digital environments, and physical materials used in construction, to illustrate discrepancies between the two practices. Yet, all digital geometries are not real until they are constructed: each digital geometry represents a digital version of its physical self. Considering the opposing states of the digital environment and built structures are we working with the same physical materials and digital geometries from formulation to fabrication? Following the Industrial Revolution, the master builder of the past has evolved into two separate professions today – the architect and the maker. The architect has relocated from the workshop to the drafting room, working from a cognitive space that has been virtualized into the digital environment of today, mediated through the computer screen and associated digital devices. While the digital environment offers the possibility to encode digital geometries as desired, this is not the case with physical materials. Physical materials embody their own material complexity and are embedded within larger networks of supply chains and requirements of labour skills. This unaccommodating perception of material behaviour results in highly resource intensive construction practices. Through understanding the network flows of physical materials and exploring the extent of encodable information within digital geometries, the research hopes to reintroduce a more empathetic perception of materials during the formulation stage that can streamline resources in construction, material, cost and time.