Digital Technologies for Evolutionary Construction

Abstract

Todays engineering of building structures is based on model thinking. Load bearing structures are developed by choosing solutions from a catalogue of systems (e.g. beam, truss, arch.) established approximately 100 years ago with the criterion of calculability and the methodology of analysis. Digital modelling, analysis, and fabrication allow not only for complex geometries but also a return to redundant, overlaying and indeterminate structural systems, as they were used when the development of load bearing structures was based on a craftsmans experience, and not on verifiable structural analysis. To go one step further, digital technologies allow for a new approach to natural systems, an option, which is neither fully realized nor explored yet.